Malnutrition – Performance Measures
A study conducted in the Netherlands sought to describe the current practice in diagnosing and treating malnutrition by medical doctors, medical students and nurses prior to, during and after hospitalization. Registered Dietitians were not mentioned in their study objective.
Malnutrition, it was stated, continues to be an important problem that is still under recognized and underrated in developed countries. A prospective analysis of current nutritional assessment practices and prescribing treatment was evaluated in a cohort of hospitalized patients from the general medical wards in Amsterdam. The analyses included the review of the chart information, referrals and discharge letters.
Three hundred and ninety-five women, aged 19-96 years, were included in the evaluation analyses. The prevalence of malnutrition was determined to be 31.9%. Nutritional information was not mentioned in written referrals. Medical doctors performed nutritional assessments in 15.3% of the cases, medical students in 52.8% of the cases and nurses in 29.9% of the cases as documented in the charts. Nutritional follow-up was appointed in a whopping 1.2% of the cases despite the high rate of malnutrition.
The conclusion of this study was that nutritional assessment and intervention were not sufficiently applied by any of the above mentioned health professionals at any stage of the hospitalization period. It would be interesting to see what our performance statistics are in the U.S. Hopefully, we would perform better than the Netherland study. And, hopefully, Registered Dietitians are more involved in patient care than what this study suggests.
About the Author
Kathy Shattler received her Master of Science degree from Michigan State University in E. Lansing Michigan in Human Nutrition. Her twenty-two years of practice includes holding positions as a Lecturer, Chief Clinical Dietitian and Program Manager. Kathy is the Founder of Nutri-Care Consulting and is currently the Nutrition Director of www.CEU4U.COM, an online continuing education management company for Registered Dietitians and Dietetic Technicians.
