Introduction: Nutritional risk is widely spread among hospitalized patients. Early identifying of patients with nutritional risk enables nutritional support in timely manner. Nurses are in constant contact with patients and therefore have key role in identifying malnourished patients. Purpose: The purpose of work is to present the impact of malnutrition on patient’s health treatment and to present the role of nurses in identifying patients with malnutrition risk and implementing nutritional support. Methods: We used a descriptive method of work. We reviewed the accessible literature of the problem in question on the web databases: Science Direct, PubMed and COBISS. Results: In malnourished patients there is a greater chance of complications during medical treatment, which can lead to an adverse outcome of treatment. Complications during medical treatment prolong the time of hospital stay, which increases the medical costs. Using the anthropometric measurements and nutritional screening tool nurses can assess patient’s nutritional status and in case of malnutrition, they refer the case to the clinical dietitian who then prescribes nutritional support. Discussion and conclusion: Nutritional risk may have a negative impact on the course of patients treatment. The poor nutritional status of the patient is strongly associated with an unplanned re-hospitalization after dismissal. Nutritional screening needs to be introduced as part of a routine procedure at patients admission to a hospital, in which nurses play a key role as they are constantly in contact with patients. Nutritional status of patients may worsen during their stay in hospital, therefore it needs to be monitored at a later stage of hospital stay to ensure successful medical outcome.
|
