Adherence to a Nurse-Driven Feeding Protocol in a Pediatric Intensive Care Unit.

Background: Patients admitted to pediatric intensive care units (PICUs) often experience prolonged periods without nutrition support, which may result in hospital-induced malnutrition and longer length of stay. Nurse-driven feeding protocols have been developed to prevent unnecessary interruptions or delays to nutrition support. The primary objective of this study was to identify compliance and reasons for noncompliance to a feeding protocol at a tertiary care hospital PICU in Canada. The secondary aim was to determine the mean time (hours) spent without any form of nutrition and to identify reasons for time spent without nutrition. Materials and Methods: This was a prospective cohort audit, consisting of 150 consecutive PICU admissions (January–February 2016). Exclusion criteria consisted of patient mortality within 48 hours (n = 1) and patients who were still admitted at the end of the data collection timeframe (n = 7). The remaining cohort consisted of 142 consecutive admissions. Data collection took p...