The impact of polypharmacy and oral nutritional supplementation on nutritional status in patients residing in a long-term care facility

Lucyna Ścisło¹Judyta Pluta^1*Anna Kliś-Kalinowska¹Michał Górski²Marta Buczkowska²

• ¹Jagiellonian University Medical College, Kraków, Poland
• ²Medical University of Silesia, Katowice, Silesian, Poland

Polypharmacy negatively affects the nutritional status of the elderly. The use of specific drugs should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, and a new drug should be introduced with caution. The supply of medications, especially among the elderly, needs more attention and analysis of their effects on nutritional status to avoid potentially dangerous consequences. The team involved in the care of the geriatric patient must be adequately aware of the potential impact, both negative and positive, that drug therapy can have on nutritional status and overall health. The publication focuses on a group of patients who are rarely involved in research. However, referring to statistics and the fact that the population is aging, it seems that the long-term care population is an important group that needs more detailed research. Among the new issues that have rarely been discussed in the literature so far, it is worth mentioning the analysis of individual drug groups in the context of nutritional status and the assessment of the risk of developing malnutrition in relation to gender, age and polypharmacy.