International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health | August 2019 | Vol 6 | Issue 8 Page 3543 International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health Singh B et al. Int J Community Med Public Health. 2019 Aug;6(8):3543-3547 http://www.ijcmph.com pISSN 2394-6032 | eISSN 2394-6040 Original Research Article Assessment of nutritional status in chronic obstructive airways disease patients in a tertiary care hospital at Himachal Pradesh, India: a cross sectional study Balbir Singh 1 , Pramod Shridhar 1 *, Kamaljit Singh 2 , Rajesh Garg 3 , Herleen Pabla 4 , Ena Sharma 5 INTRODUCTION Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is an important and growing cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. The WHO Global Burden of Disease Project estimated that COPD was the fifth leading cause of death worldwide in 2001 and will be the third leading cause by 2020. The growing burden of COPD is partly due to the ageing of the world's population and partly to the continued use of tobacco, which is the most important risk factor for this disease. The reported prevalence of COPD is highly variable ranging from 0.2% in Japan to 37% in the United States. According to the 12-site Burden of Obstructive Lung Disease (BOLD) study, the average prevalence of COPD is 10.1%, with wide variations. 1 The estimated burden of COPD in India is about 15 million cases. These figures may however ABSTRACT Background: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a major cause of morbidity and mortatlity worldwide. Malnourishment in COPD patients is very common and is a prognostic factor in its treatment. The present study has been conducted to assess nutritional status in COPD patients and its correlation with severity of disease. Methods: This institutional based analytical cross sectional study was conducted in the Department of Pulmonary Medicine at tertiary care hospital in Himachal Pradesh (India) from 1 Dec 2017 to 31 st May 2018. A total of 52 COPD participants attending the pulmonary Medicine OPD and fulfilling the inclusion criteria were enrolled. Results: All participants reported being smoker since long with the mean years of smoking since 31 years and about 13.6 cigarettes being smoked per day. 22 (42%) of the participants were undernourished as per BMI criteria But when compared with MUAC criteria, a large number 38 (73%) came out to be undernourished. haemoglobin and cholesterol levels were less in patients with severe diseases than mild and moderate category (76.9%). Conclusions: The malnourishment and severity of the disease has direct correlation. More the severity of COPD, more is the malnourishment. Biochemical parameters, although not deranged significantly in any group, but more on the lower side in patients with severe COPD. There is a need for regular nutritional assessment of every COPD patient and recommendation of supplementary food for them. Keywords: COPD, Malnourishment, Body mass index, Mid-arm upper circumference, Anthropometry 1 Department of Respiratory Medicine, MM Medical College, Kumharhatti, Solan, Himachal Pradesh, India Department of Community Medicine, 2 Dr YSP Government Medical College, Nahan, Himachal Pradesh, 3 Kalpana Chalwa Government Medical College, Karnal, Haryana, 4 Government Medical College and Hospital, Sector 32, Chandigarh, India 5 Department of Periodontics, MM Dental College, Mullana, Ambala, Haryana, India Received: 17 June 2019 Accepted: 19 July 2019 *Correspondence: Dr. Pramod Shridhar, E-mail: pramodshridhar1975@gmail.com Copyright: © the author(s), publisher and licensee Medip Academy. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License, which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18203/2394-6040.ijcmph20193485