Thesis (M.Sc.) - Cairo University - Faculty of Medicine - Department of Internal Medicine

Protein calorie malnutrition (PCM) has been described in 50 to 100 percent of patients with decompensated cirrhosis and at least 20 percent with compensated cirrhosis. PCM is associated with a number of complications including development of variceal bleeding and ascites, increased surgical morbidity and mortality, reduced survival and worsening hepatic function. To evaluate handgrip strength as a single independent indicator used as a tool of assessment of nutritional status in patients with liver cirrhosis (Child C). A cross sectional study conducted on 50 Egyptian patients recruited from outpatient clinic and inpatient section of Internal Medicine department, Kasr Alainy hospital, Cairo university. All patients had liver cirrhosis of Child C class according to child turcott pugh classification whether presenting with complications or not. Subjective global assessment (SGA), triceps skin fold thickness (TSFT), Mid - arm circumference (MAC), Body mass index (BMI) and Hand grip strength (HGS) were used to assess nutritional status in these patients. Prevalence of PCM in this study was 100%; 10 (20%) mildly malnourished, 14 (28%) moderately malnourished, 26(52%) severely malnourished when assessed by SGA. HGS showed high degree of correlation with malnutrition (p = 0.000) with sensitivity and specificity 100 % and 40 % respectively and accuracy of 88% MAC was correlated with malnutrition (r = -0.277) (p = 0.05). Both BMI and TSFT showed insignificant correlation with malnutrition. p = 0.06, p = 1.000 respectively

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