Avaliação nutricional de crianças e adolescentes internados em um hospital privado de Salvador-Bahia

Nutritional assessment of hospitalized children and adolescents is less registered in medical literature. Objective: To access nutritional profile of admitted children and adolescents from a pediatric emergency of a private hospital, in Salvador, Bahia. Methodology: It was a cross-section with retrospective data collection study, in which the children Body Mass Index were measured, at the Day of admission, between february 2011 and april 2012. The growth curve Age x Body Mass Index (z score) was applied. Four groups were divided, in terms of age range. Group A included children less than 1 year-old. Group B, 1 to 5 years old, Group C, 6 to 10 years old, and Group D, with children above 10 years old. Results: 320 children were evaluated. The Group A included 101 children (31.56%), 49 (48.51%) presented appropriate weight and 52 (51.49%) presented inappropriate weight. The Group B included 136 children (42.50%), 74 (54.41%) with appropriate weight and 62 (45.59%) with inappropriate weight. The Group C included 50 children (15.63%), 24 (48,00%) with appropriate weight and 26 (52,00%) with inappropriate weight. Finally, the Group D included 33 children (10.31%), 21 (63.6%) with appropriate weight and 12 (36.36%) with inappropriate weight. Conclusions: The age ranges included in Groups A and B were together 74.06% of the patients from that pediatric emergency. The groups A and C had higher proportion of children with