Z-SCORE: AN INDICATOR OF PROTEIN-CALORIE MALNUTRITION

Ac-cording to the World Health Organization, malnutrition is a chronic disorder of nutritional status, especially among infants and young children, triggered by the imbalance between the nutritional intake and the body’s needs to ensure the harmonious growth and development and the fulfillment of the body’s specific functions. Aim: WHO introduced the Z-score, which has been used for child growth standards; since then, malnutrition and its severity have been determined according to this score. Material and methods: We conducted a ret-rospective study of the cases of malnutrition admitted to the “Pediatric Recovery” depart-ment between May and December 2016. The sample considered for the study includes 74 in-fants showing signs of malnutrition at the moment of hospitalization: significant weight loss, asthenia, fatigue etc. Results: Of all the indicators used for the assessment of malnutrition, the Z-score is the most reliable. It expresses the anthropometric value in the number of standard deviations that are inferior or superior to the mean reference value. The graphical processing of the data showed that the Z-score for the height on admission generally ranged from -3.5 to -0.5, being below the reference limit. Conclusions: The Z-score is harder to calculate, but it is age-independent and it accurately diagnoses malnutrition.