Nutrition support from a Specialist Dietitian plays a crucial role in multidisciplinary, wholistic cancer care.
Malnutrition is a common feature in individuals with cancer and is the consequence of both the presence of the tumour and the medical and surgical anticancer treatments. Malnutrition negatively impacts on quality of life and treatment toxicities, and it has been estimated that up to 10-20% of cancer patients die due to consequences of malnutrition rather than the tumour itself (1).
Ideally, nutrition therapy should be initiated early and run in parallel to antineoplastic treatments, before patients become malnourished. Early and regular nutrition assessment can enable counselling and support to manage symptoms. It also allows early detection of nutritional disturbances and prompt treatment.
Individuals with malnutrition, or at risk of malnutrition, who are able to eat, should receive nutritional support to improve oral intake. This includes dietary advice, the treatment of symptoms impairing food intake and prescribing of oral nutritional supplements.
Side effects of cancer treatments might include mucositis, taste changes, nausea, vomiting, poor appetite, bowel changes – all of which require practical strategies that your Dietitian can help with in order to maintain nutritional status and tolerate treatment.
If oral intake remains inadequate despite nutrition interventions, or the individual is unable to digest or absorb food, other forms of nutrition support such as enteral feeding should be considered as a next step in discussion with your Doctor and Dietitian.
1. ESPEN practical guideline: Clinical Nutrition in cancer. Muscaritoli, Maurizio et al. Clinical Nutrition, 2021, Volume 40, Issue 5, 2898 - 2913
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