Malnourished versus Dehydrated

[BusyBee82]

I was discussing with someone about malnourishment and dehydration. He said my mom was malnourished. I thought my mom was dehydrated. He said that they are the same thing. I argued that no they were different. He then said that being malnourished is restricting your body from nourishment and water is nourishment. I said that malnourishment had to do with the nourishment of proteins not water. Are they related? Are they the same? What are your thoughts? please let me know.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[deleted87716]

I was discussing with someone about malnourishment and dehydration...

I presume said "someone" is a layperson?

Regardless, "nourishment" generally refers to calories, while "hydration" refers to water.

You can tell him I said so.

 

[Gharver]

Dehydration and Malnutrition are just terms to separate the two into categories. Layman's terms in this case actually apply, because water is an actual form of nourishment. Being dehydrated or malnourished are not identical to each other but I would say are related. In this particular case I'd say both sides are right and wrong.

 

[deleted87716]

Sounds like maybe the OP just needs to pick up a dictionary.

 

[Gharver]

Well if you'd like to stick to books, then if you happen to look up malnutrition it should say somewhere along the lines of "lack of nourishment". Now what's nourishment? Nutriment and sustenance. What is water? It is both nutriment and sustenance. That's the relation between the two, simply put.

 

[J-Rad]

But clinically dehydration and malnourishment (malnutrition: "faulty nutrition due to inadequate or unbalanced intake of nutrients or their impaired assimilation or utilization"-MW/Medline online dict.) are pretty different. Malnourishment/nutrition is not an acute process and needs some time to develop and is brought about by the lack of nutrients not found in water (protein, CHO, etc.). One can easily be malnourished to the point of marasmus a/o kwashiorker and still be well hydrated. Your severe anorectic is malnourished, but probably hydrated. Conversely dehydration is generally an acute to subacute process. In children with a vomiting and diarrheal illness dehydration may set in within hours. A new onset T1 diabetic may get dehydrated over the course of days to a few weeks. But the majority of those who become dehydrated are not malnourished. And the treatment for dehydration and malnourishment is pretty different as well. Probably the only time that dehydration and malnourishment a nearly synonymous, in other than a semantic but not clinically useful sense, is in the neonatal to first months period.