Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: Malnutrition and sarcopenia are interrelated and frequent in hospital settings, being related to a higher morbimortality. CIPA nutritional screening (performed at the Hospital Universitario Nuestra Señora de Candelaria) is positive when one or more of the following criteria is met: a) decreased oral intake in 72 h (<50%), b) albumin <3 g/dl, and c) BMI <18.5 g/m² or mid-upper arm circumference (MUAC) ≤ 22.5 cm.

Aim: To determine the relationship between the results of CIPA screening and the diagnosis of sarcopenia in hospitalized patients.

Method: Single-center, cross-sectional study. Hospitalized subjects >18 years old who underwent CIPA malnutrition screening were included. Loss of muscle mass was measured by bioimpedanciometry (appendicular skeletal muscle mass, ASMI), and strength by handgrip measure. Sarcopenia was established according to the EWGSOP2 diagnostic criteria.

Results: 332 patients were analyzed. The mean age was 66.04 ±14.41 years (52.1% men). Distribution by specialties is shown in table 1. CIPA was positive in 36.1% (criteria why CIPA was positive are shown in Table 2), while 19.9% of the whole sample had sarcopenia. 33.3% of positive CIPA patients had sarcopenia vs 12.3% of negative CIPA (P<0.0005). The positivity of the CIPA variables BMI/MUAC (31.8% vs 16.5%; P<0.0005) and oral intake control (35.8% vs 16.8%; P=0.001) correlated with the presence of sarcopenia. The trend to significance was observed with the positivity of albumin (27.8% vs 17.7%; P=0.058).

Conclusions: in this cohort of patients a positive CIPA nutritional screening test is related to a higher prevalence of sarcopenia, so it represents a valid tool to identify patients with the highest risk of morbimortality.