NH-022880240_Prevalence of malnutrition among Iranian children before and after hospitalization (2015 to 2017): A multicenter study

Introduction: Hospital malnutrition in children is a common nutritional problem in most part of the world. Malnutrition both weakens clinical outcomes and increases hospital costs. Therefore, the aim of this study was to develop estimates of malnutrition through a multicenter observational study at the time of admission and discharge in Iranian hospitalized children and adolescent.Methods: this study was performed on children aged one-month to 18 years from three Iranian public tertiary pediatric hospitals located in different cities in Iran. To determine nutritional status, weight for height Z-score for patients from 1month to 5years of age and BMI for age Z-score for patients ≥5 to 18 years old were calculated using WHO growth standards. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 23.Results: Information about 1499 patients was collected. At the time of admission, 64% had a good nutritional status, 15.5% were at risk of wasting, 8.4% were wasted, and 12.1% were severely wasted. Less than 1% of children under 5 years of age and 9.6% of children over 5 years of age were overweight or obese at the time of admission. Among 295 malnourished patients, 182 patients had improved at the time of discharge. The prevalence of moderate and severe malnutrition at discharge was about 20%.Conclusion: more than one third of the hospitalized children had moderate or severe malnutrition or at risk of malnutrition. Although malnutrition decreased during hospitalization but there were also children who didn’t have malnutrition at the time of admission and were malnourished at discharge.

کلیدواژه ها:

Malnutrition ، Children ، Adolescent ، Infant ، Hospital Malnutrition