Malnutrition prevalence in an outpatient cancer care setting — ASN Events

Malnutrition prevalence in an outpatient cancer care setting (#255)

Sara Kuzma 1 2 , Eimear Mahon 1 , Jessica Ramage 1 , Belinda Camilleri 1 , Alwyn Todd 1 2
  1. Mater Hospital and Health services, South Brisbane, QLD, Australia
  2. Griffith Health Institute, Griffith University, Southport, Gold Coast, QLD, Australia

Aims: Malnutrition is highly prevalent in inpatient cancer care settings and is associated with numerous detrimental effects for the patient, including reduced tolerance to anti-cancer treatment and poorer quality of life. Currently there is a paucity of research on the prevalence of malnutrition in outpatient cancer care settings. The aim of this research was to (1) determine the requirement for nutrition screening in an outpatient oncology setting; and (2) determine if the requirement for nutrition screening increases as cancer outpatients’ progress through treatment. Methods: The Malnutrition Screening Tool (MST) was utilised to conduct nutrition screening amongst all patients, followed by the validated Patient Generated Subjective Global Assessment (PG-SGA) for subjects with MST score ≥2. Cross tabulation between nutritional status and variables were conducted to identify statistical associations. Results: A total of 76 subjects were included in the study with the most common tumour types observed across the patient sample; breast (n=27, 35.5%), gynaecological (n=21, 27.6%), lung (n=10, 13.2%) and gastrointestinal (n=8, 10.5%). An MST score of ‘0’ was most frequently recorded with 52.6% (n=40) of respondents falling into this category. The prevalence of malnutrition as indicated by PG-SGA (score B or C), was 3.9% (n=3 PG-SGA B; n=0 PG-SGA C). Conclusion: The results of this study suggest the prevalence of malnutrition may be low in outpatient cancer care centres which provide chemotherapy to subjects with cancers associated with low nutritional risk. Further investigation into the prevalence of malnutrition amongst subjects in outpatient cancer care settings, especially those treating patients with cancers associated with higher nutritional risk, is required.

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