2014 Volume 29 Issue 6 Pages 1357-1362
Malnutrition causes decrease in body mass, immunodeficiency, delay in wound healing, and organ dysfunction. To prevent these events, malnutrition should be detected as soon as possible. Nutrition and Electrolyte Support Team (NEST) have adopted body composition measure apparatus by multiple-frequency bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) as nutritional assessment because the apparatus is non-invasive, and relatively simple and not expensive. However, some of patients who are managed by NEST do not have accurate measurements of multiple-frequency BIA. On the basis of this knowledge, we investigated the differences between patients who were measureable and immeasurable in multiple-frequency BIA. About 11% of patients who were managed by NEST were immeasurable in multiple-frequency BIA. Immeasurable group shows higher body mass index, white blood cell counts and serum levels of urea nitrogen, and lower serum albumin levels compared with measureable group. These findings suggest that immeasurable group tends to be edematous and dehydration in blood vessels. Nutritional assessment of patients who are immeasurable in multiple-frequency BIA is future consideration.
