Nutritional risk among ginecology patients.

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: Identify nutritional risk among patients admitted to a gynecological clinic and associate this risk with hospitalization stay and clinical complications.
METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted with a convenience sample for 6 months, involving 111 gynecological patients (adults and older adults). The assessment of nutritional risk was performed in the first 48 hours after admission using the 2002 Nutritional Risk Screening (NRS 2002) adapted by Hertlein et al. for gynecology patients. Internment time (in days) was calculated as the difference between the day of admission and discharge. Complications were transcribed from daily entries in the patient charts. Statistical analysis involved Pearson’s chi-square test, Fisher’s exact text, the Mann-Whitney test and the calculation of Spearman’s correlation coefficients. A p-value <0.05 was considered statistically significant.
RESULTS: A total of 32.4% of the patients were classified in a state of nutritional risk, 88.2% of whom had food intake < 50% of habitual intake, 70.8% of whom experienced significant weight loss in the previous six months, 53.7% of whom had a diagnosis of neoplasm, 75% of whom had a body mass index < 20.5 and 21.8% of whom had been submitted to surgery. A significant, positive correlation was found between nutritional risk and hospitalization stay (r=0.392; p<0.001). Nutritional risk was not associated with age group or the clinical complications.
CONCLUSIONS: A significant number of women in the present study were in a state of nutritional risk, which underscores the importance of diagnosing this condition among gynecological patients. Nutritional risk was associated with a longer hospitalization stay.