Nutrition Assessment

Nutritional status evaluation using the Malnutrition Universal Screening Tool (MUST), with comprehensive dietary, swallowing, gastrointestinal, and nutritional support assessment.

Scoring

Instrument: MUST.

• Step 1: BMI score (0 = > 20, 1 = 18.5–20, 2 = < 18.5).
• Step 2: unplanned weight loss in past 3–6 months (0 = < 5%, 1 = 5–10%, 2 = > 10%).
• Step 3: acute disease effect score (0 = none, 2 = acutely ill with no nutritional intake > 5 days).
• Total: 0 = low risk, 1 = medium risk, ≥ 2 = high risk. Severity levels: low (well-nourished), moderate (at risk), high (malnourished), critical (severe malnutrition with complications).

What it covers

Demographics; anthropometric measurements; dietary history; nutritional screening (MUST); swallowing and oral health; gastrointestinal function; food allergies and intolerances; nutritional requirements; current nutritional support; and care plan with monitoring.

Relationship to dietic-assessment

Dietic Assessment is the more comprehensive, dietitian-led counterpart adding GLIM malnutrition diagnosis, NRS-2002, SARC-F, and refeeding-risk screening on top of the same MUST core; this assessment is the more general, MUST-centred nutritional screen suitable for a broader range of clinical settings and assessors.

Common pitfalls

• Treating MUST as a full malnutrition diagnosis — MUST is a screening tool identifying risk; a formal diagnosis (e.g. via GLIM, see Dietic Assessment) requires further criteria.
• Missing swallowing difficulty as a nutritional risk driver — dysphagia can be the actual root cause of weight loss and reduced intake; skipping the swallowing section can miss the real problem behind an abnormal MUST score.
• Not re-screening on a schedule — nutritional risk changes, especially in acute or deteriorating illness; MUST is meant to be repeated at defined intervals, not scored once and left static.

Learn more

• FormExamples: nutrition-assessment for the full implementation, clinical references, and worked examples.
• Dietic Assessment for the related, more comprehensive dietitian-led assessment.