Nutritional assessment is an important part of looking after the health of an older person.  Malnutrition can lead to serious health problems and may even be fatal. 

Nutritional assessment ought to be quick, simple, and accurate so that those at risk of malnutrition can be helped without delay.  A new tool for nutritional assessment, the Mini Nutritional Assessment Short Form (MNA® - SF) has recently been introduced and has now been clinically validated.  The tool, from Nestlé Nutrition, can be downloaded at www.mna-elderly.com/forms/mini/mna_mini_english.pdf.

The MNA® - SF can be used as a stand-alone tool in the nutritional assessment of the elderly.  It is a shorter version of the well-known Mini Nutritional Assessment (MNA®).  The MNA® - SF can be completed in only four minutes, compared with 10-15 minutes for the longer test.  It also includes an option for using calf circumference measurement, rather than BMI, for assessing nutritional status.

Results from the MNA® - SF classify the elderly into three categories: normal nutritional status,  at risk of malnutrition and malnourished.  Previous work with the full MNA® suggest that as many as 39% of the hospitalized elderly are malnourished, while another 47% are at risk.  In the rehabilitation setting, the figures are 50% and 41%. 

The study on MNA® - SF from Dr Matthias Kaiser of the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg, Germany, covered 2032 elderly people in various care settings, such as hospitals and nursing homes.  All had been assessed by the MNA®.  Re-assessment with the new shortened version gave good agreement with the original results.  Commenting upon the study  Dr Bruno Vellas, who developed the original MNA®, said. ‘With such a tool available, specifically validated in the elderly and now more flexible, quick and easy to use, it should become standard practice to screen the elderly for malnutrition or risk of malnutrition, in order that the appropriate nutritional intervention can be implemented.’

Source: 

Kaiser MJ et al Validation of the mini nutritional assessment short form (MNA® - SF) a practical tool for identificaiton of nutritional status  Journal of Nutrition Health & Aging 2009 13 (9)