Nutritional status in locally advanced or metastatic solid cancer patients in Spain: The NutriOncoSearch (NOS) study

ABSTRACT

Background: Malnutrition is a common issue in oncology patients, and negatively affects patients' evolution and their quality of life, increasing the incidence of infection, hospital stay, and mortality. New approaches to targeted therapy and immunotherapy represent the future in the field of oncology, making it essential to understand its effect on patients. Study endpoints were (a). To describe the percentage of nutritional counseling or nutritional support among those diagnosed as malnourished or at risk. And (b) to categorize the percentage and descriptive characteristics of cancer patients with mild, moderate, or severe malnutrition in Spain and descriptive characteristics of patients with malnutrition according to sociodemographic and clinical characteristics. Methods: From a total of 585 patients from 10 hospitals, two groups were established, group A, N 408, patients undergoing immunotherapy, group B with patients with inmuno plus chemotherapy and/or radiotherapy (N 204). The objective of this observational study was to determine the prevalence (or risk) of malnutrition in the Spanish population of outpatients receiving immunotherapy. To do this, it was proposed to explore the nutritional status of these patients using Nutritional risk (NutriScore), Nutritional Global Subjective Assessment, ECOG PS;type of cancer and nutritional treatment chemo, type of chemo, and COVID-19 diagnosis. Results: In group A (Immuno only) 28.3% of the patients were at risk of malnutrition, compared to 58.5% in group B (combined Immuno plus Chem&RT) with a statistically significant difference (p<0.0001);27.4% were on nutritional therapy, 97 (42.9%) of patients who obtained a score ≥of 5 (at risk), and 63 (17.5%) %) of patients who obtained a score <5 (out of risk) in NutriScore (p<0.0001). Dietary advice was the most common type of nutritional therapy, present in 123 (76.9%) patients of 160 with nutritional therapy, followed by oral supplements (69 (43.1%)) and enteral nutrition (11 (6.9%)). Conclusions: Nutritional diagnosis is key in cancer patients. It allows determining the needs of the patient in each of the phases of the patient's evolution, improving the quality of life through different interventions, especially dietary education. Clinical trial identification NCT04168814. Legal entity responsible for the study Spanish Society of Oncology Nursing. Funding: Baxter Healthcare Corporation. Disclosure All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.