ABSTRACT
Background Nutritional screening is important in identifying persons who require treatment, as malnutrition is an under-recognised and under-treated condition [1-3]. Nutritional screening, assessment and treatment is emphasised in a resolution from the Council of Europe [4] and Swedish hospitals have been found to have dif-culties in living up to the recommendations [5]. However, knowledge about the correspondence between the ndings from nutritional screening and the actual provision of treatment is sparse. From a general perspective, knowledge about the prevalence of risk of malnutrition, i.e. undernutrition risk and overweight (including obesity), is important as it describes the magnitude of these problems and has implications for allocating health care resources for helping patients to remain or become well nourished.
