Malnutrition Quality Improvement Initiative

The Malnutrition Quality Improvement Initiative is a project of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, Avalere Health, and other stakeholders who collaborate to provide guidance and expertise for clinical malnutrition. The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics and Abbott support the MQii. The Academy works together with MQii partners and engages stakeholders to discuss malnutrition quality improvement and care transitions documented in our Dialogue Proceedings, and to discuss malnutrition and health equity documented in our Roundtable Proceedings. The primary goal is to advance evidence-based, high-quality, patient-driven care for hospitalized older adults who are malnourished or at-risk for malnutrition.

To accomplish its objectives, the MQii designed key tools for real-world application, a MQii Toolkit and electronic clinical quality measures, or eCQMs. These tools mutually support one another guiding hospitals and organizations with malnutrition quality improvement to achieve better health outcomes. The MQii Toolkit provides practical, interdisciplinary tools and resources to support hospitals establish best practices and adopt the eCQMs to evaluate their success in meeting the standards of care.

The MQii Learning Collaborative is a community of clinicians committed to improving delivery of malnutrition care in hospitals and health systems across the US. The MQii Learning Collaborative was established in 2016 and continues today with over 300 hospitals participating across the nation. These hospitals undertake a data-driven, patient-centered, malnutrition quality improvement project using the MQii Toolkit and malnutrition eCQMs to track and monitor improvement. Their results are highlighted in the 2020 Journal of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition article, "How a Malnutrition Quality Improvement Initiative Furthers Malnutrition Measurement and Care: Results From a Hospital Learning Collaborative." Featured MQii successes can be reviewed in numerous articles and abstracts published in the October 2019 Supplement to the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, "Malnutrition Quality Improvement Initiative Yields Value for Interdisciplinary Patient Care and Clinical Nutrition Practice."