Introduction:

malnutrition is a frequent event in cancer, and unless identified early, it can lead to progressive functional impairment of the organism.

Objective:

to associate the early application of the Global Subjective Evaluation Produced by the Patient (GSEPP) to the time of hospitalization and death in cancer patients.

Methods:

a cross-sectional, analytical study carried out between July and September 2014 in patient records (> 20 years) with cancer, with hospitalization for more than three days in a reference cancer hospital. Age, sex, origin, disease location, antineoplastic treatment, length of stay and application of GSEPP, type of discharge, weight loss in one and six months, body mass index (BMI) and GSEPP score were collected.

Results:

three hundred and sixty-six patients were evaluated: 51.6% women, 54.9% adults, 27.6% tumors of the digestive tract, 11.5% with metastasis, 21.9% of deaths and 40.4% with hospitalization time greater than or equal to ten days. The length of hospital stay was statistically lower in the early application of GSEPP (11.4 ± 1.5 vs 23.3 ± 1.3 days). The delay in the application of GSEPP was positively correlated with the increase in length of hospital stay, the GSEPP score, as well as malnutrition by BMI and weight loss in one and six months.

Conclusion:

early application of GSEPP was associated with improvements in the parameters of malnutrition, shorter hospitalization time, but not mortality. Measures that abbreviate its application should be taken to awaken the importance and the impact of this instrument in the health of the evaluated patient.

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