Neelemaat F, Bosmans J, et al 2011

21527171

Post-discharge nutritional support in malnourished elderly individuals improves functional limitations.

Neelemaat F, Bosmans J, Thijs A, Seidell J, van Bokhorst-de van der Schueren M

Journal of the American Medical Directors Association

2011

12

4

295-301

Randomized Controlled Trial

Low risk

60 + years of age; hospital admission expected length > 2 days; newly admitted to the departments of: General internal medicine, rheumatology, gastroenterology, dermatology, nephrology, orthopedics, traumatology, and vascular surgery; malnourished according to the following criteria:; BMI of 20 or lower; unintentional weight loss of 5% in the previous month; unintentional weight loss of 10% or more in the previous 6 months.

Senile dementia; could not understand Dutch language; not able or willing to give informed consent

To investigate the effects of postdischarge nutritional support in malnourished elderly individuals, especially with respect to short-term clinically relevant health outcomes, from hospital admission until 3 months after discharge.

A computerized random number generator was used to assign patients, in blocks of 10, to either the intervention or the control group. After the baseline interview and measurements, the primary investigator opened a consecutively numbered opaque envelope containing the patients' group assignment. Participants, research assistant, and researcher were no longer blinded for the intervention from this point. When performing the analyses, the primary investigator was not aware of the patients' group assignment.

VU University Medical Center, Amsterdam

Not-for-profit

The Netherlands Organisation for Health Research and Development (ZonMw)