Early post-operative diet upgrade in older patients may improve energy and protein intake but patients still eat poorly: an observational pilot study.

Although the majority of older patients received early diet upgrade and these patients consumed more energy and protein than those on fluid diets, as a whole, older patients ate poorly post-operatively. Fluid diets should therefore not be used indiscriminately and other approaches to improve post-operative intake of older patients, such as fortified diets, oral nutritional supplements and meal environment interventions, should be adopted.