Clinical significance of nutritional risk screening tool for hospitalised children with acute burn injuries: a cross‐sectional study

摘要

Abstract Background We assessed the nutritional risks among children hospitalised with acute burn injuries and their associated clinical outcomes using three nutritional risk screening ( NRS ) tools: Screening Tool for Risk of Impaired Nutritional Status and Growth ( STRONG KIDS ), Pediatric Yorkhill Malnutrition Score ( PYMS ) and Screening Tool for the Assessment for Malnutrition in Pediatrics ( STAMP ). Methods This prospective cross‐sectional study was conducted from October 2015 to November 2016, in a regional burn centre. Patients were screened by two independent observers, using the three NRS tools. Results A total of 100 children aged 3 months to 16.5 years were included. STRONG KIDS identified 16% of patients as having high risk, with being identified 45% by PYMS and 44% by STAMP . After adjustment for confounding factors in multivariate regression analysis, patients in the high‐risk group had significantly longer median (SD) lengths of stay [medium versus high risk: STRONG KIDS , 9.5 (6.6) versus 15.0 (24.2) days; PYMS , 8.5 (4.4) versus 13.0 (16.1) days; STAMP , 9.0 (5.7) versus 11.0 (17.4) days] and greater median (SD) weight loss [medium versus high risk: STRONG KIDS , 0.15 (0.8) versus ‐0.35 (0.8) kg; STAMP, 0.5 (0.7) versus 0 (0.1) kg] than patients in the medium‐risk group ( P 0.05). The strengths of agreement in the nutritional risk classification between the two observers were good (κ for STRONG KIDS = 0.61; PYMS = 0.79; STAMP = 0.75) ( P 0.01). Conclusions The STRONG KIDS , PYMS and STAMP tools could be useful and practical for determining which hospitalised children with acute burn injuries will need additional nutritional intervention.