Abstract: Objective To investigate therole of primary nursing in nutritional risk screening in patients with astrointestinal cancer. Methods Total 400 newly admitted gastrointestinal cancer patients in our hospital between May 8,2010 and March 31,2013 were selected and randomly divided into control group and observation group with 200 cases in each group.The control group received routine care,while the observation group received the primary nursing on the base of the routine nursing.The nutritional risk screening was performed in both groups.The outcome of patients after the surgery and nursing satisfaction were compared between the two groups. Results The nutritional support was performed in both groups after the nutritional risk screening.The nutrition status indicators such as albumin and prealbumin content,incidence of post-operative complication and hospital stays were not significant between the two group(P＞0.05).However,the quality of nursing service was improved and patients satisfaction was more than 98% in the observation group when compared with the control group (P<0.05).The nursing negligence in the observation group(2%)was significantly lower than that in the control group(7%). Conclusion To perform the primary nursing with nutritional risk screening work in gastrointestinal cancer patients can improve nursing service and patient satisfaction,and worth further clinical practice.