Dehydration and Malnutrition in Nursing Homes

Adequate water intake and properly balanced meals are important for all individuals to maintain a healthy, functioning body. When elderly adults don’t receive the right care (usually from their caretakers), it often results in dehydration and malnutrition in nursing homes.

In care facilities, this often occurs due to nursing home neglect, and even if such mistreatment is unintentional on the part of the caretakers, the effects on elderly residents can still be damaging.

Why Residents Become Dehydrated and Malnourished

Dehydration happens when you don’t drink enough water or lose water too quickly through sweating, vomiting, or diarrhea. Certain medications can cause increased urination, which raises the risk of dehydration.

Data from the National Library of Medicine (NLM) shows that adults aged 65 and older are at greater risk of suffering from dehydration because their bodies don’t hold as much water, and they can’t tell as easily when they’re thirsty.

Malnutrition occurs when your body is either not receiving or not retaining the right amount of nutrients to meet your body’s needs. Another NLM report shows that elderly adult who suffer from malnutrition are less likely to recover from its effects, greatly compromising their health.

• Undernutrition means that your body has a deficiency of nutrients, either due to inadequate diet or your body has trouble absorbing nutrients from food.
• Overnutrition is the opposite and is caused by excessive consumption of nutrients, which can lead to obesity and also toxicity from overdosing on certain nutrients over others.

In nursing homes, both dehydration and malnutrition are generally caused by caretakers neglecting their residents by not providing them with adequate amounts of or access to water and proper portions of healthy food. This often occurs when facilities are understaffed, and there are too many residents under the care of one caregiver, causing the caregiver not to have the time or energy to choose balanced meals or take sufficient care of each resident.

Although this type of neglect is usually unintentional, it can still cause serious problems and often results in these neglected nursing home residents developing illnesses or suffering from severe side effects.

Signs of Dehydration

Water is important for your body to function. It aids digestion, lubricates joints, balances your body’s chemicals, delivers oxygen throughout your body, and so much more. So, when your body doesn’t have enough water, it can cause health problems. Fortunately, the symptoms of dehydration are rather easy to notice:

• Dark-colored urine
• Headache
• Dry, pale skin
• Dry mouth
• Canker sores
• Sporadic urination
• Loss of appetite, but maybe craving sugar
• Swollen feet
• Constipation

More severe symptoms are:

• Disorientation or slurred speech
• Irritability
• High heart rate accompanied by low blood pressure
• Inability to think or act straight
• Delirium
• Hallucinations
• Accelerated breathing
• No sweating
• Seizures

Understanding the signs of dehydration is important, especially if you have a loved one in a nursing home or extended care facility. If you can recognize these signs, it greatly lessens the chances of your loved one suffering severe adverse effects of dehydration, as you will.

Signs of Malnutrition

When we think of malnutrition, we usually envision children in third-world countries whose bones are prominent through their thin skin, but that’s not the only sign of a malnourished person. Depending on the type of malnutrition occurring, there are varying symptoms we might notice.

Undernutrition may look like:

• Low body weight (specifically with prominent bones)
• Fatigue or overall weakness
• Thin arms and legs with swelling in the belly and face
• Irritability or apathy
• Low heart rate and blood pressure
• Low body temperature and the inability to get warm
• Frequent and severe infections
• Loss of appetite
• Brittle hair or hair loss
• Rashes and lesions

Overnutrition may look like:

• High blood pressure
• Obesity
• Heart disease
• Insulin resistance

It is important to understand the different types of malnutrition and the varying signs and symptoms that coincide with improper intake of nutrients. Older nursing home residents often can’t speak up for themselves when it comes to their care, so it’s up to us to pay attention and ensure they are receiving sufficient food.

Complications That Arise From Improper Sustenance

The effects of dehydration and malnutrition in nursing homes are often quite severe in elderly adults, especially those who already have other illnesses or health concerns. It’s pertinent to understand how this type of neglect can affect those who suffer from it and why we should quickly intercede on behalf of those showing signs and symptoms.

Dehydration can cause the following complications:

• Kidney stones and kidney disease
• Seizures
• Swelling of the brain
• Urinary tract infections (UTIs)
• Coma
• Hypovolemic shock
• Death

Malnutrition can cause these complications:

• Blindness from prolonged vitamin A deficiency
• Soft bones from prolonged vitamin D deficiency
• Insulin resistance
• Carotid artery disease

With the proper medical intervention, most of these complications may be reversible, but the effects may be long-lasting and quite damaging, especially in elderly adults.

What You Can Do About Neglect of a Resident’s Dietary Needs

As with any other type of elderly mistreatment in nursing homes or anywhere, it’s imperative to the health and safety of our loved ones that we pay attention to the quality and cleanliness of the nursing home itself and how the staff treat their residents.

One of the best things we can do is visit frequently and ask questions about their day and meals. If your loved one is unable or unwilling to speak about how much water they’ve had or the last meal they ate, talk to their caregivers or nursing home staff.

If you believe your loved one is dehydrated, malnourished, or suffering from any other form of neglect, there are ways to report nursing home abuse. There are also options available to you if you choose to pursue legal action after confirming the presence of dehydration and malnutrition in nursing homes.

The well-being of all nursing home residents should be a priority, and we are the ones who can speak and act on behalf of our older loved ones, the most vulnerable population.