"CORRELATION BETWEEN MODIFIED SUBJECTIVE GLOBAL ASSESSMENT WITH ANTHROPOMETRIC MEASUREMENTS AND LABORATOARY PARAMETERES"

Abstract

Although protein-calorie malnutrition is common among the hemodialysis patients and is associated with increased rates of morbidity and mortality, assessment of nutritional status of these patients is frequently ignored in many dialysis centers. Malnutrition can be estimated using a semiquantitative scale, subjective global assessment (SGA) but subjective nature of this scale restricts its reliability. In this study, we evaluated the malnutrition status in 71 hemodialysis patients by a recently developed, fully quantitative scoring system, dialysis malnutrition score (DMS) instead of conventional SGA and compared the results with laboratory and anthropometric measurements of malnutrition. Consequently, this revealed that DMS significantly correlated with the anthropometric measurements and an important laboratory parameter, serum transferrin level. The conventional SGA had only significant correlation with anthropometric measurements. These results confirmed the role of SGA as a reliable method in assessment of malnutrition, but it must be performed by a physician or trained nurse and is time consuming. Regarding these limitations, we suggest DMS as an alternative method for SGA in assessment of nutritional status of hemodialysis patients.