Assessment of nutritional status in pediatric population is necessary to predict growth patterns and signs associated with malnutrition. However, it has become increasingly apparent that pediatric nutritional assessment is not adequately performed and therefore frequently missing out on children with severe nutritional needs. The main objective of this study was to determine the health care workers' practices regarding the nutritional assessment of sick children at the Pediatric Emergency Unit (PEU) at Kenyatta National Hospital. The study population was health care workers comprising doctors, clinical officers and the nurses working at the unit. The study was designed as an observation and descriptive study using self-administered questionnaire and observation checklist. The study results reveal almost all nurses (96.8%) attempted all the required observations for nutritional diagnosis of all the patients. Among the clinicians, majority (78.6%) didn't attempt all the observation required for all the patients. The study showed that only 29.52% of the respondents had knowledge that weight loss was a critical indicator of patient nutritional status. Merely, 12.38% of the respondent had knowledge that change of caregivers and home circumstances had impact on nutritional status of a child. Only 38.64% of the health workers had some training on assessment of nutrition status of HIV/AIDS children. The findings indicated that only 44.44% of the respondents always inquired on who feeds the child. Among the study participants only 47.73% of the respondents often gave nutritional advice to care-givers. Despite the lack of knowledge, universally 98% of the respondents agreed that nutritional assessment for pediatric emergency patients is important with only 2% dissenting. Apparently, Nutritional assessment at the pediatric unit was not optimal. Therefore, measures should be instigated to improve and facilitate efficient nutritional assessment of the children visiting the unit.
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