Authors that criticize artificial nutrition for patients with
advanced dementia usually state that this therapy brings no
benefits on lengthening survival (11). However, both Kumagai
et al’ study (20) and the Brazilian one (2) bring a new insight
on enteral feeding and PEG for the dementia patients showing
that it can prolong life (20) or at least equal the length of
survival of patients with dementia to the one presented by
patients without dementia (2). This is reinforced by data of
Israeli studies on patients’ survival which suggest that enteral
feeding was not harmful to patients either because the results
were similar to those obtained with the oral route (14, 19).
Advanced dementia is a life-limiting illness, which imposes
some doubts related to the ability of EN on prolongation of life.
This is particularly important when considering the findings of
a similar survival among patients with and without dementia
who receive enteral nutrition, as a positive aspect favouring
artificial nutrition.