Immunonutrition and Enhanced Recovery After Surgery

Enhanced Recovery After Surgery (ERAS) is an evidence-based multimodal pathway to reduce surgical stressand limit post-surgical morbidity. Nutrition is one of the key elements of the programme.This symposium,held at the 2015 ERAS Congress, looked at the evidence for one critical aspect of peri-operative nutrition,that of supplementation with immune-enhancing components. There is a great deal of literature on thesubject, the vast majority of which is positive, and this body of evidence was reviewed by the speakers. Thesymposium closed with a review of the potential cost savings through the use of immunonutrition, whichhave also been reported in the literature.