Screening the nutritional status in oncology: a preliminary report on 1,000 outpatients

• Published in: Supportive care in cancer 2009-03, Vol.17 (3), p.279-284
• Main Author: Bozzetti, Federico
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Female; Humans; Italy - epidemiology; Male; Mass Screening; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Middle Aged; Neoplasms - complications; Nursing; Nursing Research; Nutrition; Nutrition Assessment; Nutrition Disorders - diagnosis; Nutrition Disorders - epidemiology; Nutrition Disorders - etiology; Nutritional Status; Oncology; Original Article; Pain Medicine; Prevalence; Prospective Studies; Rehabilitation Medicine; Surveys and Questionnaires; Weight control
• ISSN: 0941-4355; 1433-7339
• DOI: 10.1007/s00520-008-0476-3

Objective This study presents the preliminary data of a prospective multi-centre investigation on the screening of the nutritional status of cancer outpatients with the purpose to define: (1) prevalence and rate of weight loss and nutritional risk in this patient population, and (2) to assess the association among some patient-dependent, tumour-dependent and therapy-dependent variables with the nutritional status and the nutritional risk. Materials and methods Seventeen centres were involved to collect demographic data (age and sex), oncologic data (site of primary tumour, stage, Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group Performance State, oncologic therapy) and presence and severity of systemic and digestive/nutritional symptoms (fatigue, anorexia, nausea/vomiting, early satiety, dysgeusia/dysosmia, dysphagia/odynophagia, diarrhoea/constipation). Furthermore, the percentage of the weight loss on the usual body weight and the body mass index were computed. The nutritional risk was assessed according to the Nutrition Risk Screening 2002 questionnaire which scores the risk from 0 to 7. Main results On the first 1,000 screened patients, a significant weight loss (≥10%) and a nutritional risk score ≥3 were observed in 39.7% and 33.8% of patients, respectively. Weight loss was higher in upper gastrointestinal tumours, in advanced stages of disease and in patients with a poor performance status. Similarly, the nutritional risk was higher in esophageal and pancreatic cancer and in those with a worse performance status. There was a good correlation between the severity of anorexia and the rate of the weight loss The majority of patients with no weight loss or a weight loss