The Validity of Nutritional Status as a Marker for Future Disability and Depressive Symptoms Among High‐Risk Older Adults

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Abstract
OBJECTIVE To measure the validity of the DETERMINE Checklist as a marker for future functional disability, depressive symptoms, and mortality among high‐risk older adults. DESIGN A Cohort study. SETTING An Urban‐suburban Midwestern community. PARTICIPANTS Community‐dwelling Medicare beneficiaries at high risk for hospital admission who received geriatric evaluation and management (GEM) (n = 251). MEASUREMENTS Demographic, health‐related, functional, psychosocial, survival, and nutritional data were collected through telephone and in‐home interviews. RESULTS GEM recipients with baseline Checklist scores of four or higher were found to be significantly more likely than those with lower scores to have functional disability or high levels of depressive symptoms a year later. Checklist scores did not predict mortality. CONCLUSIONS The 10‐item Checklist could be used as a secondary screen to identify older persons who, without treatment, are at especially high‐risk to have disability or depression a year later.