Abstract: Objective To evaluate the applicability of Royal Free Hospital-nutritional prioritizing
tool (RFH-NPT) and nutritional risk screening 2002 (NRS-2002) tools for nutritional risk screening
in hospitalized decompensated liver cirrhosis patients. Methods A total of 202 hospitalized patients
with decompensated liver cirrhosis in Department of Hepatology, Beijing Ditan Hospital, Capital
Medical University from October 2023 to December 2023 were selected. The NRS-2002, RFHNPT
and subjective global assessment (SGA) were used to screen and assess the nutritional risk of
the patients. SGA combined with laboratory indicators was used as the gold standard. The receiver
operator characteristic (ROC) curve was used to evaluate the effects of NRS-2002 and RFH-NPT on
nutritional screening for patients with decompensated cirrhosis. Results Among the 202 patients, the
incidence of anemia, hypoalbuminemia and low lymphocyte count were 47.52% (96/202), 92.08%
(186/202) and 90.59% (183/202), respectively. According to the SGA, RFH-NPT and NRS-
2002, the proportions of malnutrition/nutritional risk in patients with decompensated liver
cirrhosis were 31.19% (63/202), 51.49% (104/202) and 38.61% (78/202), respectively. The
sensitivity and specificity of RFH-NPT tool were 93.65% and 67.63%, respectively, and
the area of the ROC curve was 0.81. The sensitivity and specificity of NRS-2002 tool were
68.25% and 74.82%, respectively, and the area of the ROC curve was 0.72. The area under
the ROC curve of the RFH-NPT nutritional risk screening tool was significantly higher than
that of NRS-2002 (Z = 2.41, P = 0.016). Conclusions The RFH-NPT is more suitable for
nutritional risk screening in patients with decompensated liver cirrhosis than the NRS-2002.
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