Purpose: Total Parenteral Nutrition began to be applied frequently in the houses of patients starting from the 1990s and is stated in literature as Home Parenteral Nutrition (HPN). The purpose of this review is to answer the question of whether or not HPN is safe for cancer patients.
Methods: Searches were conducted in Cochrane, CINAHL, PubMed, Springer, Google Scholar, and the Web of Science databases.
Results: The 1,949 articles were accessed in the total, and 20 articles have been included in the review. In the studies being evaluated, it can be determined that HPN has influenced the quality of life, performance status, and the nutrition level of cancer patients positively. Most frequently seen complications were infections relating to the catheter, the mechanical obstruction in the catheter and venous thrombosis. For each 1,000 days with HPN or a catheter, infections in the interval of 0.05 and 3.08, mechanical problems in the interval of 0.07 and 2.13, and thrombosis in the interval of 0.05 and 0.20 were determined.
Conclusions: While HPN influenced quality of life, nutrition, and the personal performance of cancer patients positively, the rate of complications is at a level that can be managed at home.
Keywords: cancer patient; feeding; home; home parenteral; home parenteral feeding; home parenteral nutrition; nutrition; parenteral feeding.
© 2019 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.