[Evaluation of malnutrition of hospitalized children by the Screening Tool for the Assessment of Malnutrition in Paediatrics].

Background: Among the major tasks of medical and nursing care during child hospitalization belong nutritional risk screening and identification of patients requiring nutritional support. The main objective of the study was to verify the usefulness of rating scale The Screening Tool for the Assessment of Malnutrition in Paediatrics (STAMP) to assess the risk of development of malnutrition in hospitalized children.

Methods: To compare results of risk of development of child malnutrition was used the score of Paediatric nutritional risk. The sample consisted of 130 respondents (73 boys, 57 girls) aged 2 months to 18 years (average 8 years), who were hospitalized at the University Hospital of Ostrava- at the Department of Paediatrics.

Results: A difference was found in detection of risk of development of malnutrition though STAMP scale between children with different medical diagnoses (p=0.000) and in different age categories (p=0.0418). No difference was found in detection of malnutrition among the sexes. A significant difference was found in detecting risk of malnutrition between the scales (p=0.000). The overall consensus of risk of formation of malnutrition between the two scales was 46.9%. A higher number of high risk of development of malnutrition was found by the STAMP scale.

Conclusion: Screening of malnutrition through the STAMP scale can identify paediatric patients who suffer from malnutrition or are threatened with its development.