Malnutrition Awareness WeekTM is an annual campaign organized by the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition (ASPEN) to provide healthcare professionals with tools for identifying and treating malnutrition in their patients.
Malnourished patients have longer hospital stays, twice the need for rehab or long-term care, and a 2.3 times higher rate of hospital deaths. In addition to its human toll, malnutrition raises hospital costs by 73% and can cost an additional $10,000 in hospital readmission stays.
Malnutrition Awareness Week, held from September 14–18, 2026, will offer live webinars and various complimentary resources addressing malnutrition in both adult and pediatric patients. Each webinar provides 1–1.5 CME credits and is free to ASPEN members and supporting ambassador institutions. The webinars will start at noon ET each day of that week, covering the following topics:
- September 14: A Pediatric Perspective to the Malnutrition Care Score (MCS)
- September 15: Post-ICU Syndrome (PICS) and Nutrition: From Survival to Recovery
- September 16: From Prehab to Post-op: How Multimodal Prehabilitation Programs Can Improve Surgical Outcomes
- September 17: Managing Malnutrition and Muscle Wasting in Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) to Improve Patient Outcomes
- September 18: Starving for Success: Identifying and Mitigating Malnutrition with GLP-1 Use
Visit the Malnutrition Awareness Week website to register for the webinars, access complimentary malnutrition resources, and learn how your institution can become an MAW ambassador.