Subjective vs objective nutritional assessment study in children: a cross-sectional study in the northwest of Iran

Area of Science:

• Pediatric Nutrition
• Clinical Assessment
• Nutritional Status Evaluation

Background:

• Assessing nutritional status in hospitalized children is crucial but lacks a universally agreed-upon method.
• Existing methods for evaluating pediatric nutritional status include subjective global assessment (SGA) and objective measures (anthropometric and biochemical).

Purpose of the Study:

• To compare the effectiveness of subjective global assessment (SGA) against objective assessments in evaluating nutritional status among hospitalized pediatric patients.
• To analyze the agreement and linear relationship between SGA and objective nutritional assessment methods in children.

Main Methods:

• A study involving 140 hospitalized pediatric patients (mean age 6.43 years) was conducted.
• Patients underwent both subjective assessment using the SGA questionnaire and objective assessment, including anthropometric and biochemical measurements.
• Agreement between the two assessment methods was statistically analyzed using kappa statistic and linear correlation.

Main Results:

• The Subjective Global Assessment (SGA) method indicated a higher overall prevalence of malnutrition compared to objective assessment methods.
• The agreement between SGA and objective assessments was found to be fair to moderate (kappa = 0.336, P = .000).
• A fair to moderate linear relationship was observed between the two assessment methods (r = 0.374, P < .05).

Conclusions:

• There are significant differences between subjective global assessment (SGA) and objective methods in evaluating the nutritional status of pediatric patients.
• Subjective Global Assessment (SGA) may be valuable in detecting trends in nutritional status that might be overlooked by single anthropometric and biochemical assessments.
• Further research is warranted to establish optimal nutritional assessment strategies for hospitalized children.