Complementarity of nutrition screening with Global Leadership Initiative on Malnutrition criteria for diagnosing malnutrition in critically ill patients: A comparison study of Nutritional Risk Screening 2002 and modified Nutrition Risk in the Critically Ill Score.

Background And Aim: Critical illness induces hypermetabolism and hypercatabolism, increasing nutrition risk (NR). Early NR identification is crucial for improving outcomes. We assessed four nutrition screening tools (NSTs) complementarity with the Global Leadership Initiative on Malnutrition (GLIM) criteria in critically ill patients.

Methods: We conducted a comparative study using data from a cohort involving five intensive care units (ICUs), screening patients for NR using NRS-2002 and modified-NUTRIC tools, with three cutoffs (≥3, ≥4, ≥5), and malnutrition diagnosed by GLIM criteria. Our outcomes of interest included ICU and in-hospital mortality, ICU and hospital length of stay (LOS), and ICU readmission. We examined accuracy metrics and complementarity between NSTs and GLIM criteria about clinical outcomes through logistic regression and Cox regression. We established a four-category independent variable: NR(-)/GLIM(-) as the reference, NR(-)/GLIM(+), NR(+)/GLIM(-), and NR(+)/GLIM(+).

Results: Of the 377 patients analyzed (median age 64 years [interquartile range: 54-71] and 53.8% male), NR prevalence varied from 87% to 40.6%, whereas 64% presented malnutrition (GLIM criteria). NRS-2002 (score ≥4) showed superior accuracy for GLIM-based malnutrition. Multivariate analysis revealed mNUTRIC(+)/GLIM(+) increased >2 times in the likelihood of ICU and in-hospital mortality, ICU and hospital LOS, and ICU readmission compared with the reference group.

Conclusion: No NST exhibited satisfactory complementarity to the GLIM criteria in our study, emphasizing the necessity for comprehensive nutrition assessment for all patients, irrespective of NR status. We recommend using mNUTRIC if the ICU team opts for nutrition screening, as it demonstrated superior prognostic value compared with NRS-2002, and applying GLIM criteria in all patients.