Background: Considering the importance of the effect of malnutrition on the prognosis of patients and the different nutritional patterns of younger and older patients, this study was conducted to investigate the effects of malnutrition on the prognosis of patients in two age groups
Methods: This study was conducted on 114 non-traumatic patients aged 40 to 65 years and 65 to 80 years admitted to the ICUs of Al-Zahra Hospital, Isfahan. The MNA-SF questionnaire was used to assess nutritional status and the patients were divided into three groups: normal nutritional status, at risk of malnutrition, and malnutrition. The duration of hospitalization, the incidence of death in the ICU, the need for mechanical ventilation, and the duration of mechanical ventilation were compared between the three groups.
Findings: By controlling for the effect of age, malnutrition is significantly associated with an increase in the duration of hospitalization compared to normal nutritional status (P=0.004). While nutritional status, controlling for age, had no significant effect on the need for mechanical ventilation, duration of mechanical ventilation, and mortality of patients (0.227, 0.447, and 0.537, respectively)
Conclusion: Patients who are malnourished usually spend longer periods of treatment in medical centers. This highlights the importance of assessing the nutritional status of patients at all stages of treatment and indicates that attention to nutritional status can be considered as one of the key factors in effective treatment management.