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DEFREE Enteral Nutrition Calculator by ESPEN guidelines*
Knowledge about enteral nutrition compliant to the guidelines is essential to the education as an intensive care specialist. This calculator aims to spread this knowledge and help users to get familiar with correct dosing of the available products.
To reach ICU calculator even faster, “Add to Home screen” from your smartphone Internet browser.
Why accurate patient enteral nutrition calculation is important?
Every intensive care patient with a stay longer than 48 hours is considered to be at risk for malnutrition.
These patients, unless absolute contraindications are present or they can eat, should receive nutritional therapy, preferably – enteral nutrition ( ICU nutrition ). During the first week of stay, hypocaloric nutrition, meeting 70% of caloric needs, is recommended. After that time, full isocaloric nutrition can be delivered. The early strategy changes when indirect calorimetry is used to estimate energy expenditure. In that case isocaloric nutrition should be targeted from the third day of stay.
The impact of adequate nutrition has been documented in multiple studies, showing that both hypocaloric and hypercaloric nutrition has a negative impact on patient outcomes.
FREE Enteral Nutrition Calculator by ESPEN guidelines*
Knowledge about enteral nutrition compliant to the guidelines is essential to the education as an intensive care specialist. This calculator aims to spread this knowledge and help users to get familiar with correct dosing of the available products.
To reach ICU calculator even faster, “Add to Home screen” from your smartphone Internet browser.
Why accurate patient enteral nutrition calculation is important?
Every intensive care patient with a stay longer than 48 hours is considered to be at risk for malnutrition.
These patients, unless absolute contraindications are present or they can eat, should receive nutritional therapy, preferably – enteral nutrition ( ICU nutrition ). During the first week of stay, hypocaloric nutrition, meeting 70% of caloric needs, is recommended. After that time, full isocaloric nutrition can be delivered. The early strategy changes when indirect calorimetry is used to estimate energy expenditure. In that case isocaloric nutrition should be targeted from the third day of stay.
The impact of adequate nutrition has been documented in multiple studies, showing that both hypocaloric and hypercaloric nutrition has a negative impact on patient outcomes.
Underfeeding has been consistently shown to result in an increased risk of infectious complications, impairs wound healing, prolongs duration of mechanical ventilation and hospitalization. Overfeeding, likewise, can impair weaning from mechanical ventilation, cause hepatic dysfunction, azotemia and volume overload. The adherence to isocaloric nutrition has been shown to reduce mortality in ICU patients.
Despite this evidence, goals of nutrition are reached rarely and, in observational studies, patients have been shown to be routinely underfed, with energy and protein intake of approximately 60%, on average. This suggests that we, as intensive care community, can and have to improve on this subject. Read more about scientific sources.
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