Nutrition UP 65

Abstract

The Nutrition UP 65 project is financed through the European Economic Area Grants (PT06 Public Health Initiatives Program, ref. 40NU05) and developed by the Faculty of Nutrition and Food Sciences of the University of Porto. The project started in April 2015 and will end on April 2017. The Nutrition UP 65 project intends to reduce nutritional inequalities in the Portuguese older population through a better understanding of the conditions related to imbalances in nutritional status. Specifically, this project will focus on undernutrition, obesity, sarcopenia, frailty, hydration and vitamin D status. These items were selected because among older adults they are strongly linked to worse health outcomes such as increased morbidity, mortality and costs of care. Since these conditions are acknowledged as potentially preventable and treatable, Nutrition UP 65 data will provide a basis to delineate public health policies and programs, contributing to a healthy aging of the Portuguese population. Additionally, to improve the nutritional status of older adults, this project also aims to develop the competencies and skills of health specialists, caregivers, older adults and their relatives regarding healthy nutrition and how to attain and maintain a good nutritional status. In the long term we expect that this will help reaching the goals of this project. Within this presentation, the study design as well the preliminary results will be presented and discussed.