Cost-effectiveness Study of the CIPA Screening Method for Patients With Nutritional Risk at Hospital Admission

Objectives: To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of implementing a malnutrition screening tool "CIPA" at the Hospital Universitario Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria (HUNSC), comparing the impact on health and the healthcare costs of hospitalised patients who are screened for malnutrition and of patients following standard clinical practice. Methodology: The study will consist of a controlled trial on patients admitted to the Internal Medicine and General and Digestive Surgery wards at the HUNSC. In both wards patients will be assigned to a control or to an intervention group. The control group will follow usual hospital clinical care, while the intervention group will be administered the screening tool "CIPA" for early detection of malnutrition cases and they will be treated according to the screening results. The following variables will be evaluated: length of stay in hospital, mortality, readmissions and in-hospital complications. Cost-effectiveness analysis will be undertaken measuring effectiveness by Quality-Adjusted Life Years (QALYs). Cost per patient will be measured by identifying health care resource utilisation, and the cost-effectiveness measure will be the Incremental Cost-Effectiveness Ratio (ICER). Investigators will calculate the incremental cost per QALY gained related to the intervention. This analysis will allow to quantify the costs (incurred and saved) related to the introduction of the malnutrition screening tool CIPA in the hospital context and to measure the health impact of screened patients.