Nutritional Screening in Hospitalized Patients with Acute Pancreatitis: A Comparative Study in Mexico

Background: Acute pancreatitis (AP) is an acute inflammatory condition with high metabolic demands; however, early detection of nutritional risk is underestimated and there is no universal consensus on which is most effective for predicting nutritional risk. Objectives: To compare the level of agreement of nutritional screening methods with subjective global assessment (SGA) in identifying nutritional risk in patients with AP. Methods: This study was conducted as a prospective observational cohort in hospitalized patients diagnosed with mild or moderate AP. Screening tools: nutritional risk screening-2002 (NRS-2002), malnutrition universal screening tool (MUST), short nutritional assessment questionnaire (SNAQ), malnutrition screening tool (MST) and clinical assessment via SGA were performed. Results: Nutritional risk was found in 55.3% patients via SGA assessment, 43.2% in MST, and 38.6% in NRS-2002 and SNAQ and 10.6% in MUST scales. Patients without nutritional risk exhibited a significantly higher mean BMI than at-risk patients (p = 0.026). Patients with moderate AP exhibited a 3.93 increased risk of nutritional risk compared to those with mil AP (p = 0.02). The NRS-2002 and SNAQ scales achieved the highest agreement compared with SGA. Conclusions: Nutritional risk is highly prevalent in patients with mild and moderate AP, showing a significant increase as clinical severity progresses. The NRS-2002 and SNAQ scales had more agreement and better performance when compared with SGA.