Addition of Micronutrient supplements to nutritional therapy of no benefit to malnourished patients: Study
Switzerland: A recent study published in Nature's European Journal of Clinical Nutrition showed that nutritional support reduces mortality and improves other clinical outcomes in malnourished medical inpatients. However, there was no evidence that trials using micronutrient supplementation in addition to nutritional therapy were superior to those with no supplementation. This implies the need for further research on the role of micronutrient supplementation in addition to nutritional support.
There is enough evidence from randomized controlled trials that have shown that different types of nutritional support interventions improve clinical outcomes in malnourished medical inpatients. However, it is unclear whether trials using micronutrient supplementation in addition to nutritional therapy are superior to trials without micronutrient supplementation. To clarify the same, Philipp Schuetz and the team from Switzerland performed a secondary analysis of a systematic search and meta-analysis.
They searched the online databases from inception to December 15, 2020, for randomized controlled trials comparing the nutritional support interventions vs. usual care on all-cause mortality (primary endpoint) of medical inpatients with nutritional risk. Trials were stratified on the basis of whether or not micronutrient supplementation was used as part of the nutritional strategy.
The review included 23 randomized controlled trials (5 trials with and 18 trials without micronutrient supplementation) with a total of 6745 patients.
Following were the study's key findings:
- Overall, mortality was significantly lower in patients receiving nutritional support compared to control group patients with an odds ratio of 0.74.
- There was no difference between trials with and without micronutrient supplementation on mortality (odds ratio 0.70 vs. 0.77).
- No differences in effect were found regarding non-elective readmissions and length of hospital stay.
"While nutritional support reduces mortality and improves other clinical outcomes, there was no evidence that trials using micronutrient supplementation in addition to nutritional therapy were superior to trials with no supplementation," wrote the authors. "There is a need for further research on the role of micronutrient supplementation in addition to nutritional support."
Reference:
Kaegi-Braun, N., Germann, S., Faessli, M. et al. Effect of micronutrient supplementation in addition to nutritional therapy on clinical outcomes of medical inpatients: results of an updated systematic review and meta-analysis. Eur J Clin Nutr (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41430-021-01061-7
