Adherence to COVID-19 Nutrition Guidelines Is Associated with Better Nutritional Management Behaviors of Hospitalized COVID-19 Patients

Abstract

Good nutritional support is crucial for the immune system to fight against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). However, in the context of a pandemic with a highly transmissible coronavirus, implementation of nutrition practice may be difficult. A multicenter electronic survey involving 62 dieticians was conducted, in order to understand barriers associated with dieticians’ adherence to nutrition guidelines for hospitalized COVID-19 patients in Indonesia. 69% of dieticians felt under stress when performing nutrition care, and 90% took supplements to boost their own immunity against the coronavirus. The concerns related to clinical practice included a lack of clear guidelines (74%), a lack of access to medical records (55%), inadequate experience or knowledge (48%), and a lack of self-efficacy/confidence (29%) in performing nutritional care. Half (52%) of the dieticians had performed nutrition education/counseling, 47% had monitored a patient’s body weight, and 76% had monitored a patient’s dietary intake. An adjusted linear regression showed that guideline adherence independently predicted the dieticians’ nutrition care behaviors of nutrition counselling (ß: 0.24 (0.002, 0.08); p = 0.04), and monitoring of body weight (ß: 0.43 (0.04, 0.11); p = 0.001) and dietary intake (ß: 0.47(0.03, 0.10); p = 0.001) of COVID-19 patients. Overall, adherence to COVID-19 nutrition guidelines is associated with better nutritional management behaviors in hospitalized COVID-19 patients.