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Background & Aims: The Mini Nutritional Assessment (MNA) is the most used tool to assess malnutrition and/or its risk among older adults. Its Screening section was proposed as a short form (MNA-SF) but studies comparing the two forms present controversial results. Our main aims were to study the agreement between MNA-SF and its full form (MNA-FF) among Portuguese older adults living in the community and to develop a more sensible version of the MNA-SF.
Material And Methods: This cross-sectional study used a convenience sample of 456 older adults (54.2% females) aged 65-92 years (mean = 73; SD = 6). Data analyzed included: nutritional status (MNA), social support (Fillenbaum's Social Network Index), level of independency in daily activities (Lawton e Brody's scale) and eating-related quality of life. Both MNA-FF and MNA-SF classify participants as malnourished, at risk of malnutrition or with normal nutrition status. Anthropometric assessments (weight, height, arm and calf perimeters) were carried out and BMI was computed.
Results: The agreement between the two classifications is 82.7%, but Cohen's k shows a weak agreement (weighted Cohen's k = 0.497; p < 0,001), and the sensitivity of the MNA-SF to detect malnutrition or its risk (as assessed by the MNA-FF) was 42.6% (despite a specificity of 98.8%). Participants classified as normal using the MNA-SF despite at risk using the MNA-FF present lower scores in two items from the Assessment section (number of full meals eaten daily and amount of fluid consumed per day). These were included in MNA-SF to obtain an extended short-version (MNA-SF8). The difference between the ROC curves for MNA-SF and MNA-SF8 justifies the preferential use of the MNA-SF8 with an estimated cut-off of 14 points, which showed high sensitivity (91.8%) and specificity (79.9%).
Conclusions: The addition of two items to the MNA-SF provides a more sensible tool to detect the risk of malnutrition among older adults. General eating-related questions seem relevant to assess malnutrition in this age group.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.clnesp.2021.10.018 | DOI Listing |
JAMA Dermatol
September 2025
Department of Population Health, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Herston, Queensland, Australia.
Importance: Increasingly, strategies to systematically detect melanomas invoke targeted approaches, whereby those at highest risk are prioritized for skin screening. Many tools exist to predict future melanoma risk, but most have limited accuracy and are potentially biased.
Objectives: To develop an improved melanoma risk prediction tool for invasive melanoma.
JAMA Netw Open
September 2025
Oncostat U1018, Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM), Ligue Contre le Cancer, Paris-Saclay University, Villejuif, France.
Importance: Antibiotics, steroids, and proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) are suspected to decrease the efficacy of immunotherapy.
Objective: To explore the association of comedications with overall survival (OS) in patients with advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC).
Design, Setting, And Participants: This nationwide retrospective cohort study used target trial emulations of patients newly diagnosed with NSCLC from January 2015 to December 2022, identified from the French national health care database.
JAMA Netw Open
September 2025
School of Nursing, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China.
Importance: The efficacy of home end-of-life care in enhancing the quality of life for terminally ill patients and families has been well documented. While previous studies have explored perspectives on quality home palliative care and end-of-life care in several countries, limited knowledge exists regarding its specific components in the Chinese context.
Objective: To explore the core elements that constitute quality home end-of-life care in China.
JAMA Netw Open
September 2025
Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts.
Importance: Research in behavioral economics has demonstrated that people have irrational biases, which make them susceptible to decisional shortcuts, or heuristics. The extent to which physicians consciously might use nudges to exploit these heuristics and thereby influence their patients' decision-making is unclear. In addition, ethical questions about the conscious use of nudges in medicine persist, yet little is known about how physicians experience and perceive their use.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJAMA Netw Open
September 2025
Division of Gastroenterology, Department of Medicine, University of California San Diego, La Jolla.
Importance: Janus kinase (JAK) inhibitors are highly effective medications for several immune-mediated inflammatory diseases (IMIDs). However, safety concerns have led to regulatory restrictions.
Objective: To compare the risk of adverse events with JAK inhibitors vs tumor necrosis factor (TNF) antagonists in patients with IMIDs in head-to-head comparative effectiveness studies.