BSNA is delighted to support this year’s Malnutrition Awareness Week (11-17 November), launched by the Malnutrition Taskforce and BAPEN in 2018 to raise awareness of undernutrition and dehydration in the UK.

The campaign’s focus in 2024 is on encouraging everybody to work together to improve understanding, identification, prevention and management of malnutrition and dehydration. 

BSNA and our members wholeheartedly this aim and call on government and NHS leaders to give greater priority to given to identifying and managing malnutrition, to mitigate the serious consequences for patients and reduce huge costs for health and social care.

With an estimated three million people at risk of malnutrition in the UK[1], raising awareness of the value of good nutrition and hydration is a vitally important message for health and social care. 

The NICE Clinical Guideline on nutrition support for adults (NICE CG32)[2] recognises that malnutrition is both a cause and an effect of ill health and that ‘good nutrition support services’ are crucial in treating a number of other conditions.

The guideline requires that all care services take responsibility for the identification of people at risk of malnutrition and provide nutrition support for everyone who needs it, and that an integrated approach to the provision of services is fundamental to the delivery of high-quality care to adults who need nutrition support.

The effective management of malnutrition could have a significant impact on the health economy as the annual health and social care costs associated with malnutrition are estimated at nearly £20 billion in England alone.[2]

Research published last year by Future Health [3] showed that nearly half a million people admitted to NHS hospitals in England have malnutrition – equivalent to over 50 people admitted to hospital every hour.

As the Government consults on the development of its 10 Year Plan for the NHS, to be published in Spring 2025, Malnutrition Awareness Week is a vital opportunity to demonstrate the case for investing in nutritional care and its contribution to the shift towards prevention and care closer to and in the home. BSNA’s recently updated publication, Better Care Through Better Nutrition sets out in more detail both the challenge that malnutrition represents and the benefits of investing in nutritional care as a priority.  You can access our leaflet here:  https://shorturl.at/MECzX

BSNA represents manufacturers who produce medical nutrition, including oral nutritional supplements, enteral tube feeds, specialist infant formula and parenteral nutrition.

You can read more about MAW and how you can support it here. https://www.bapen.org.uk/malnutrition/uk-malnutrition-awareness-week/

#UKMAW2024

[1] Elia M, on behalf of Malnutrition Action Group of BAPEN and the National Institute for Health Research Southampton Biomedical Research Centre (2015). The cost of malnutrition in England and potential cost savings from nutritional interventions. Accessed online: www.bapen.org.uk/pdfs/economic-report-full.pdf (November 2024)

[2] NICE (2006). Nutritional support for adults: oral nutrition support, enteral tube feeding and parenteral nutrition. Clinical guideline [CG32]. Accessed online: www.nice.org.uk/guidance/cg32 (November 2024):

[3] Future Health (2023) Hiding in Plain Sight: Hiding in plain sight: Tackling malnutrition as part of the prevention agenda. Accessed online  https://www.futurehealth-research.com/publications/hiding-in-plain-sight-tackling-malnurition-as-part-of-the-prevention-agenda/ (November 2024)