Causal factors of under diagnosis in cachectic patients affected by cancer of the gastrointestinal tract
International Journal of Development Research
Causal factors of under diagnosis in cachectic patients affected by cancer of the gastrointestinal tract
Received 18th September, 2020 Received in revised form 04th October, 2020 Accepted 09th November, 2020 Published online 30th December, 2020
Copyright © 2020, Lívia de Aguiar Valentim. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited
Cancer is a chronic multifactorial disease, characterized by the uncontrolled proliferation of cells occurring in different regions of the body, among them in the gastrointestinal tract, related to this cachexia is a syndrome that is characterized by weight loss, lipolysis, muscle atrophy, anorexia, chronic nausea and asthenia. This study aimed to assess the occurrence of underdiagnosis of cachexia in cancer patients. For this purpose, 13 medical records were analyzed, evaluating admission characteristics and nursing developments. Of these six (46.15%) showed signs of cachexia, of which one (7.69%) was diagnosed, the diagnosis being made in another city and seven (53.84%) were not evaluated. Of the five patients (38.46%) showed signs of cachexia, two (15.38%) showed signs of refractory cachexia and three (23.08%) of cachexia in the second stage, the records of the others did not contain enough information to allow assess this clinical condition.
