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“MALNUTRITION AWARENESS WEEK RECOGNITION” mentioning the U.S. Dept of Agriculture was published in the Extensions of Remarks section on pages E1325 on Sept. 27, 2018.
The Department is primarily focused on food nutrition, with assistance programs making up 80 percent of its budget. Downsizing the Federal Government, a project aimed at lowering taxes and boosting federal efficiency, said the Department implements too many regulations and restrictions and impedes the economy.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
MALNUTRITION AWARENESS WEEK RECOGNITION
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HON. LYNN JENKINS
of kansas
in the house of representatives
Thursday, September 27, 2018
Ms. JENKINS of Kansas. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition of this week as Malnutrition Awareness Week.
Malnutrition Awareness Week is a multi-organizational, multi-pronged campaign created by the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition. This campaign seeks to educate healthcare professionals to identify and treat for malnutrition earlier. It seeks to educate consumers and patients to discuss their nutrition status with health care professionals and increase awareness of nutrition's role on patient recovery.
Every 60 seconds, 10 hospitalized patients with malnutrition go undiagnosed, and many of these patients are older adults. Yet, there are common-sense solutions that can close this care gap.
We cannot solve what we do not first measure. Unfortunately, we do not truly know the full extent of the malnutrition problem plaguing our senior population. This is because screening measures for malnutrition are not a part of our national health surveys and malnutrition is not included in the national health indicators and goals for older Americans that help shape public health programs and guide healthcare professionals. I therefore call on the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to routinely include malnutrition screening measures in national health surveys of older adults and include malnutrition among national key health indicators and Healthy People 2030 goals for older adults.
We cannot expect older adults and their families to take steps to address malnutrition if we do not give guidance on identification of and interventions for the problem. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and U.S. Department of Agriculture develop new national dietary guidelines every five years, but the guidelines have never addressed the issue of older adult malnutrition. I therefore urge HHS and USDA to include dietary guidance for the prevention and treatment of older adult malnutrition and the closely aligned problem of age-
related sarcopenia, the loss of strength and muscle, in the 2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans.
We cannot advance malnutrition care and promote improved patient recovery if we do not align the identification of and interventions for malnutrition with health care quality incentive programs. Malnutrition can lead to greater risk of chronic disease, frailty, disability, and increases in healthcare costs, yet nutrition status is rarely evaluated and managed as individuals transition across care settings. I therefore call on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to include malnutrition related quality measures in Traditional Medicare quality programs as well as include measures related to malnutrition in care transition programs.
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