Afro-Egypt J Infect  Endem  Dis  2018 March ; 8(1):1

Nutritional Status and Informational Needs for Patients with Liver Cirrhosis

Lamiaa Zaki Ahmed ¹, Nadia Mohamed Taha²,  Mohamed El-khashab³ and                                 Eman Elsayed Hussein⁴

¹B.Sc. Nursing, Faculty of Nursing, Zagazig University,Egypt.

²Medical Surgical Nursing, Faculty of Nursing, Zagazig University,Egypt.

³Tropical medicine Department, Faculty of medicine, Zagazig University,Egypt.

⁴Medical Surgical Nursing, Faculty of Nursing, Zagazig University,Egypt.

lamiaazaki631@yahoo.com

 

ABSTRACT

Background and study aim: Malnutrition is as an important complication of liver cirrhosis with prognostic implications; a marked knowledge gap exists concerning the information needs of liver cirrhosis patients. The aim of this study is to assess nutritional status and informational needs for patients with liver cirrhosis.

Subjects and Methods: A descriptive exploratory design was used in this study. The present study conducted in tropical medicine and gastroenterology units at Zagazig University Hospitals, A purposive sample of 115 patients, The study lasted from the beginning of October 2016 to the end of May 2017 .Three tools were used for collection of data, first tool was a structured interview questionnaire consisted of personal characteristics of patients, second tool was nutritional assessment form, third tool was informational needs questionnaire.

Results: The study findings revealed that more two third of studied patients were in the age group of less than Session [CurrentTestPartID] years with mean age 53.4±9.3 years, the majority of studied patients were in malnutrition (73.9%). By Subjective Global Assessment (SGA), there are strong correlation between SGA and Child Pugh score, the most important informational needs among the studied patients were medical domains 84.4%. In contrast, psychological domains achieved the least important 27.0%.

Conclusion: It can be concluded that patients with liver cirrhosis are suffering from malnutrition and nutritional deficiencies, and also patient with liver cirrhosis had different levels of informational needs.  The most prioritized informational needs  for patients with liver cirrhosis was Medical domain whereas the least priority was given to the Psychological domain. It also shows that information needs differ based on some socio-demographic and clinical characteristics and physical condition.