title: Incidence of Tube Feeding in 7174 Newly Admitted Nursing Home Residents With and Without Dementia.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Tube feeding is a common form of long-term nutritional support, especially for nursing home residents, of whom many have dementia.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  Estimating the incidence of feeding tube placement in nursing home residents with and without dementia.
  
  
  METHODS
  Using claims data, we studied a cohort of newly admitted nursing home residents aged 65 years and older between 2004 and 2009. Analyses were stratified by dementia. We estimated incidence rates and performed multivariate Cox regression analyses.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The study cohort included 7174 nursing home residents. Over a mean follow-up of 1.3 years, 273 people received a feeding tube. The incidence per 1000 person-years was 28.4, with higher estimates for patients with dementia. When adjusting for age, sex, and level of care as a time-dependent covariate, influence of dementia decreased to a nonsignificant hazard ratio.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  It seems that not dementia itself but the overall clinical condition might be a predictor of tube feeding placement.
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Economics, Health Policy and Outcomes Research, Centre for Social Policy Research, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany Jana.schulze@uni-bremen.de.
authors.forename: Jana
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Schulze
authors.affiliation: Department of Interdisciplinary Research on Ageing and Nursing, Institute for Public Health and Nursing Science, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany.
authors.forename: Rosa
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Mazzola
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Services Research, Carl von Ossietzky University Oldenburg, Oldenburg, Germany.
authors.forename: Falk
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Hoffmann
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D003704:Dementia / Q000451:nursing*; D004750:Enteral Nutrition / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D006302:Health Services Research; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D044342:Malnutrition / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000517:prevention & control; D009735:Nursing Homes; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D012720:Severity of Illness Index
keywords: dementia; feeding tube; health services research; incidence; nursing home; nursing home residents