Underdiagnosis and undertreatment of malnutrition in hospitalized adult patients can result in longer length of stays, higher risk of readmission, greater mortality and higher hospital costs. For the last several years, the Academy/ASPEN Indicators for Malnutrition (AAIM) have been commonly used to diagnose malnutrition in hospitalized adult patients. However, these consensus-derived criteria need to be connected to patient health outcomes across hospital settings. Panelists representing clinical dietetics, inpatient nutrition administration, and the broader medical nutrition community discuss a cutting-edge project to connect malnutrition diagnoses based on the AAIM indicators with patient outcomes and ramifications of this work for best practices in care of adult patients with malnutrition.