Malnutrition and associated factors among heart failure patients on follow up at Jimma university specialized hospital, Ethiopia

Background: Malnutrition and cachexia are serious consequences of numerous chronic diseases. Severe heart failure patients could be related with marked weight loss. Malnutrition is associated with poor prognosis among heart failure patients. Despite its implication, factors associated with malnutrition among heart failure patients in Africa and Ethiopia was not addressed. Hence, in this study we tried to determine factors associated with malnutrition among heart failure patients on follow up at Jimma University specialized hospital, Ethiopia. Methods: A cross-sectional study was done on 284 randomly selected heart failure patients. The nutritional status of the patients was assessed based on their serum albumin level (normal value 4-5 mg/dl) and triceps skin fold thickness. The data was analyzed using SPSS version 20.0. Multivariable logistic regression was used to identify factors associated with malnutrition among heart failure patients using SPSS 20.0. Results: Based on serum albumin and triceps skin fold thickness, 77.8 % of patients were malnourished. Mean age of the patients was 48.3 +/- 15.9 years. The commonest cause of heart failure was ischemic heart disease (34.9 %). Hypertension (36 %) was the commonest co morbid disease. Forty four percent of patients had New York heart association functional class II heart failure. Serum hemoglobin (AOR = 0.77, 95 % CI: 0.67-0.92) was found to be significantly associated with nutritional status of heart failure patients. As serum hemoglobin increases by 1gm/dl, the risk of malnutrition decreased by 15 % (P value = 0.03). Conclusions: The majority of patients were malnourished. A higher hemoglobin concentration was associated with reduced odds of being malnourished.