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Handbook of Clinical Nutrition and Aging pp 303–312Cite as

Nutrition at the End of Life

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Abstract

Nutritional support during the final phase of life is an important and sensitive issue that must be addressed through careful discussion between patients, the patient’s loved ones, and the health care team. Because food is an integral part of day-to-day life, the loss of interest in or the inability to partake in this activity often causes great distress for caregivers. Furthermore, caregivers view provision of food and hydration as basic care and not medical treatment, and as such they frequently struggle to determine which feeding options to choose for their loved ones. In the final weeks of an individual’s life, the issues central to decisions about nutritional support shift to a cautious weighing of its burdens and benefits. Therefore, health care providers need to be well versed in the issues surrounding nutrition and hydration in terminal illness in order to assist patients and their families in treatment decisions. This chapter will focus on the benefits and limitations of nutritional support in the final weeks to months of life. The principles presented in this chapter may not be generalizable to populations with a longer life expectancy, even if the underlying disease process is similar.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Geriatrics, Department of Medicine, San Francisco VA Medical Center, University of California San Francisco, 4180 Clement St. 181 NH, San Francisco, CA, 94121, USA

    Michi Yukawa M.D., M.P.H.

  2. Department of Medicine, University of California San Francisco, 3333 California Street, Suite 380, San Francisco, CA, 94118, USA

    Christine Seel Ritchie M.D., M.S.P.H.

Authors
  1. Michi Yukawa M.D., M.P.H.
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  2. Christine Seel Ritchie M.D., M.S.P.H.
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Christine Seel Ritchie M.D., M.S.P.H. .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Geriatric Research, Education, and Clinical Center, Department of Medicine, Durham VA Medical Center, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, USA

    Connie Watkins Bales

  2. Departments of Medicine and Health Care Organization and Policy Translational Nutrition and Aging Program, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama, USA

    Julie L. Locher

  3. Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging, Tufts University, Boston, Massachusetts, USA

    Edward Saltzman

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Yukawa, M., Ritchie, C.S. (2015). Nutrition at the End of Life. In: Bales, C., Locher, J., Saltzman, E. (eds) Handbook of Clinical Nutrition and Aging. Nutrition and Health. Humana Press, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-1929-1_19

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-1929-1_19

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  • Publisher Name: Humana Press, New York, NY

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  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4939-1929-1

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