Dear Editor,
We read with interest the letter by Dr A Kumar in response to our paper (1). We welcome his supportive comments regarding our findings that catering limitations were not major contributory factors for inadequate food intake by hospitalised elderly patients. Protected mealtimes have been an imaginative solution proposed to address some of these limitations. It is interesting to note that their study (2) showed that protected mealtimes did not improve food intake, though it did reduce weight loss.
With equivocal results to date, it is important to conduct larger further studies to explore this important issue regarding nutrition in hospitalised elderly patients.
References
- 1.Patel M.D., Martin F.C. Why don't elderly hospital inpatients eat adequately? The journal of Nutrition, Health & Ageing. 2008;124:227–231. doi: 10.1007/BF02982626. 10.1007/BF02982626 [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- 2.Das A.K., McDougall T., Smithson J.A.J. Benefits of family mealtimes for nursing home residents: Protecting mealtimes may similarly benefit elderly inpatients. BMJ. 2006;332:1134–1135. doi: 10.1136/bmj.332.7553.1334-d. 10.1136/bmj.332.7550.1134 [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]