Determinants of Malnutrition Onset in nursing home residents: a longitudinal study (Preprint)

BACKGROUND Malnutrition is a multifactorial and chronic condition, frequently developing gradually due to a combination of biological, functional, and psychosocial factors. OBJECTIVE This study investigates the impact of general function, oral health, and nutritional factors on the time to onset of malnutrition. METHODS This is a retrospective study utilizing longitudinal interRAI data from nursing home residents for the period 2020-2025. The interRAI instruments are standardized, internationally validated, and electronically supported assessment tools to facilitate real-time data capture, analysis, and clinical decision support. Survival analysis (time-to-event analysis), by means of Cox proportional hazard models, was employed to calculate the impact of several indicators on malnutrition. RESULTS Baseline assessments from 1,633 residents (mean age 85.68±7.82, 65.22% female) were split into assessments with malnutrition at baseline (154 residents, 9.43%), or not (1,479, 90.57%). The samples differed significantly with higher proportions in the sub-sample with malnutrition at baseline: depressive symptoms (53% vs. 34.2%, p