Some bioethicists consider older age as a limiting factor for receiving special medical care. Older adults comprise the majority of home enteral nutrition patients (neoplams of the head, neck, and upper gastrointestinal tract neuromuscular swallowing disorders, dementia, etc) On the contrary, there are very few data on Home Parenteral Nutrition (HPN) in the elderly. We report these of a 75 years old man affected from a severe short bowel syndrome due to mesenteric thrombosis. After a hospital stay of two months he was sent home on HPN. His current caregiver was her wife, a 72 year old woman suffering from incipient Parkinson's disease. HPN lasted for 11 years and was stopped because of clinical deterioration. During this time he presented 5 catheter- related infections (1.3 episodes/1,000 days). 5 catheters were used (average length 788 days). He was hospitalized four times because of HPN complications. Functional status was maintained along almost all the length of HPN.
Conclusions: The rate of complications in this patient was similar to other groups of age receiving HPN. The technique was not burdensome for the family. Older age cannot be consider, by itself a limiting factor when receiving long term nutritional support.