More training and awareness are needed to improve the recognition of undernutrition in hospitalised children.

Aim: Reports suggest that 10% of hospitalised children in Europe are undernourished. We investigated whether nutritional screening tools (NST) were used in Belgian secondary-level hospitals, examined strategies for detecting undernutrition and identified barriers preventing the systematic management of undernutrition.

Methods: A nationwide questionnaire-based survey of paediatric departments in Belgian secondary-level hospitals was carried out from September 2013 to February 2014.