Samenvatting

Already at diagnosis, head and neck cancer patients are at risk for malnutrition. Local symptoms such as swallowing problems are a major cause of malnutrition in these patients.1 Additionally, malnutrition may result from changes in smell and taste/aversion and loss of appetite. Presence of these systemic symptoms at diagnosis may be indicative for the cachexia syndrome. Therefore, we tested the hypothesis that head and neck cancer patients to be treated with primary or postoperative (chemo)radiation suffer from cachexia.