• Emanuele Cereda, Catherine Klersy, Carlo Pedrolli, Barbara Cameletti, Chiara Bonardi, Lara Quarleri, Silvia Cappello, Alberto Bonoldi, Elisa Bonadeo, and Riccardo Caccialanza.
• Nutrition and Dietetics Service, Fondazione IRCCS Policlinico San Matteo, Pavia, Italy. Electronic address: e.cereda@smatteo.pv.it.
• Clin Nutr. 2015 Feb 1; 34 (1): 74-8.

Background & AimsNutritional derangements are common in elderly patients, but how nutritional risk affects outcome in this subset of hospital inpatients deserves further investigation. We evaluated the impact of nutritional risk on length of stay (LOS) and in-hospital weight loss (WL) in elderly patients (>65 yrs).MethodsNutritional risk was assessed by the Geriatric Nutritional Risk Index (GNRI) in a prospective multicentre hospital-based cohort study. The outcomes were LOS and in-hospital WL.ResultsIn the whole sample (N = 667), the prevalence of high (GNRI < 92) and mild (GNRI: 92-98) nutritional risk were 33% and 25%, respectively. Patients with a high nutritional risk were more likely (OR = 1.89; 95%CI: 1.22-2.92) to stay longer in hospital (fourth quartile, LOS ≥ 20 days) compared to those without. Other factors associated with prolonged LOS were cancer diagnosis (OR = 2.52; 95%CI: 1.69-3.75), the presence of comorbidities (OR = 1.24; 95%CI: 1.11-1.40) and surgical setting (OR = 1.65; 95%CI: 1.10-2.47). In-hospital WL ≥ 5% was recorded in 75 ambulant patients from a representative subgroup (N = 583). It was independently associated with prolonged LOS (OR = 1.80; 95%CI: 1.03-3.06) and was more frequent among cancer patients (OR = 1.88; 95%CI: 1.09-3.24), in patients with a high nutritional risk (OR = 2.23; 95%CI: 1.20-4.14) or those admitted to surgical units (OR = 1.77; 95%CI: 1.02-3.05).ConclusionsNutritional risk assessed by the GNRI on admission, predicts LOS and in-hospital WL in elderly patients.Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd and European Society for Clinical Nutrition and Metabolism. All rights reserved.

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