Keynote speaker - Food in Later Life and
Chief Executive, International Longevity Centre, London

Malnutrition in older people in the community a major problem - 40% of GPs unaware

"We always have to remember that food and eating are very social. It's terribly important who we're eating with, where we're eating with them.

I'm reminded of a trainer of people delivering Meals on Wheels who told me that that very morning she'd had a phone call from an elderly woman who said 'I've had meals on wheels from you for the last 15 years, but I don't need them any more because my cat died this morning'. That's stayed with me, because, for her, her only contact, the only context who she could touch, feel, and who responded to her was that cat. What was most important for her social well-being that the cat was well fed and eating [more so] than that she was eating.

We do not always recognise the level of malnutrition in older people in this country. It's very, very high.

Most people, including GPs, do not seem to recognise this. A recent survey in this country found that 40% of GPs never thought about malnutrition - they didn't even see it as a problem at all. And it really is, because up to 10% of people in Nursing Homes - who are nearly always elderly - suffer from real malnutrition.

If you are already frail and a bit weak, if you don't have enough nourishment in your body, you are just going to have complications and die sooner than is necessary. Everybody [seems to be] talking about the rise in longevity, the fact that it's such a triumph when people live longer. It's not much fun if you live longer in a state of chronic frailty, weakness and debility.

People going into care do very badly. They lose body weight mass at about 5% in the first month. People going into nursing care lose even more - about 10% of body weight. So these are big problems. We have to look after people from the point of view of making sure they get adequate food - and adequate water. Dehydration is another huge point.

We forget just how important nutrition really is. If you don't keep your body strength as you get older, this leads to long term immobility, weakness, frailty and indeed death."

Biography
Sally Greengross became a crossbench (independent) member of the House of Lords in 2000 as Baroness Greengross of Notting Hill.
Before entering the Lords she was Director-General of Age Concern for 13 years and established many innovative programmes including Action on Elder Abuse, the Employer's Forum on Age, Ageing Well and the Debate of the Age.
She is currently Chief Executive of the International Longevity Centre, a charity that promotes research into, and understanding of, the implications of demogragphic change. She co-chairs the Alliance for Health and the Future, which encourages greater societal awareness of issues relating to healthy ageing, and is a board member or adviser to a large number of national and international charities and voluntary bodies.
Baroness Greengross was voted UK Woman of Europe in 1990 and holds honorary doctorates from seven UK universities.