Assessment of malnutrition in patients undergoing chemotherapy at the National Oncology Centre of the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, Accra, Ghana.

Background: Globally, cancer is on the rise despite several interventions. The link between nutrition and cancer has long been established with the consequences of poor nutrition on cancer pathway being dire. Early nutrition intervention is recommended for all cancer patients.

Objective: To assess malnutrition among patients undergoing chemotherapy at the National Radiotherapy Oncology and Nuclear Medicine Centre of the Korle-Bu Teaching hospital (KBTH) in Accra, Ghana.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 123 patients with different types and stages of cancer who were undergoing chemotherapy. Data was collected from December 2018 to January 2019. The PG-SGA tool was used to assess weight loss at one and six months, food intake and nutrition impact symptoms. A correlation test was used to test the association between PGSGA score and Nutritional triaging. A T-test was used to determine the association between chemotherapy cycles and nutrition. A p-value <0.05 was considered to be significant.

Results: The results revealed that 5.7% (n= 7) of the patients were well nourished, 31.7% (n= 39) were suspected of being malnourished and 62.6% (n=77) were severely malnourished. About half of the participants (48%) had experienced weight loss ranging between 1-20kg with weight loss ≤5kg being most prevalent at both one month and six months prior to the study. More than half (56.9%, n=70) of the participants were consuming less than their usual intake. Majority of the participants had 4-6 nutritional symptoms (39.0%) with symptoms being mostly mild (39.1%). Poor nutritional status was positively correlated with nutritional symptoms (r=0.747, p<0.001).

Conclusion: The PGSGA tool identified that more than half of the patients were severely malnourished hence the need for early nutrition intervention in cancer patients.