Nutritional Intervention and Outcomes in Elderly After Hip Fracture Surgery

Elderly patients with hip fracture have a high rate of malnutrition. In a cohort study of hip fracture patients aged 70 years or older, 18.8% have malnutrition and 44.6% are at risk of malnutrition. Increasing evidence suggest that preoperative nutritional status has a significant impact on clinical outcomes of elderly patients following surgery. For example, preoperative malnutrition or risk of malnutrition is associated with increased delirium, increased non-delirium complications, prolonged hospital stay, high mortality, and even worse long-term survival after surgery. We speculate that perioperative nutritional intervention may reduce postoperative delirium and improve early and long-term clinical outcomes in elderly hip-fracture patients. The purpose of this study is to observe the effect of perioperative nutritional intervention on early postoperative delirium and complications as well as long-term survival in the patients with malnutrition or at risk of malnutrition who are scheduled for hip-fracture surgery.