The MNA score in people who have aged successfully.

61 One of the main objectives of gerontological medicine is to assist people reaching retirement age to age successfully. As defined by Rowe & Khan [1, 2], successful aging encompasses three distinct domains: avoidance of disease and disability; maintenance of high physical and cognitive function, and sustained engagement in social and productive activities. More studies are needed which contrast successful aging with unsuccessful aging or with pathological conditions leading to poor health status. These studies will enable clinicians to become more aware of how to maintain or restore an acceptable degree of health to elderly patients. Studies designed to examine the impact of good nutritional habits in maintaining the health status of elderly people have shown that assessing the degree of undernutrition in an elderly patient can be beneficial in the treatment of that patient [3, 4]. However, until recently there has not been a reliable, validated instrument to assess whether poor nutritional habits may be the cause of poor health or may possibly impede the restoration of good health in some elderly patients. The Mini Nutritional Assessment (MNA) was designed for this purpose. The MNA [5] is a standardized and validated instrument which can be easily administered in a short period of time to determine whether the patient may be at risk for undernutrition. In this chapter, we describe the results of using the MNA instrument in 330 elderly individuals enrolled in the New Mexico Aging Process Study (NMAPS) [6].