AUSTRALIAN NUTRITION SCREENING INITIATIVE

A new nutrition screening tool has recently been launched to help corr ect the neglect of the problem of malnutrition in elderly Australians. It is estimated that up to 30% of people over 60 years of age living independently in the community ave suffering from malnutrition. poor n utrition increases the time an older person requires to recover from a cute illness, and bads to longer hospital stays, more complications an d higher readmission rates. These factors all lend to a poor health ou tcome and increased health cave costs, The Australian Nutrition Screen ing Initiative is a checklist to be used to identify those elderly peo ple,who may be at risk from malnutrition. This screening initiative re presents the first national effort to raise tire awareness of the prob lem of malnutrition among elderly people by bringing together organisa tions with a common interest in this problem.