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Pediatric nutrition in practice: 2nd revised edition
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This article was originally published by Medknow Publications & Media Pvt Ltd and was migrated to Scientific Scholar after the change of Publisher.
This book has been written with an objective of describing the various aspects of paediatric nutrition in detail. There are only a few books which provide detailed information on ‘Pediatric Nutrition’. Most of the available books restrict only to describe the assessment of nutrition and management of malnutrition. Some of these also include breast and complementary feeding.
This book has been divided into three sections namely, ‘Specific Aspects of Childhood Nutrition’, ‘Nutrition of Healthy Infants, Children and Adolescents’ and ‘Nutritional Challenges in Special Conditions and Diseases’, and four annexures.
In the first section, the authors have attempted to describe most of the aspects of childhood nutrition in a concise manner. The topics have been chosen carefully and the authors have done justice with the subject. Apart from describing the process of nutritional assessment, nutritional needs of various age groups and the contribution of essential constituents like protein, carbohydrates and fats have also been described. The chapters on food safety and gastrointestinal development need special mention as these are usually not dealt with in most of the other books available on this topic. The recent concept of nutrient intake values (NIV) replacing the existing RDA (Recommended Dietary Allowances) is also discussed and is noteworthy.
The second section deals with the various aspects of infant and young child nutrition starting from breast feeding going up to adolescent nutrition and also the diet of a mother during pregnancy and lactation. Infancy is a critical period where an infant triples his/her birth weight in the first year itself. This high growth velocity requires specific feeding practices. The age of complimentary feeding after six months of exclusive breast feeding and the amount and quality of complimentary foods also need specific recommendations which have been covered in this book. The chapter “Marketing of Breast Milk Substitutes” describes the International code of marketing and its monitoring in a concise manner.
The last section deals with nutritional challenges in specific conditions and diseases which is certainly a valuable information. Diet of children with specific problems needs certain modifications, which have been described well here. The chapter on childhood feeding problems and nutrition rehabilitation of eating disorders have been written well, and is of interest since information on these subjects is not available in many books.
The authors have included WHO, CDC and Euro growth charts for measuring growth of the infant in specific geographic areas. One can also do comparisons between the various growth standards. The chapter on reference nutrition intake, suggests various formulae and dietary assessments in children and is of practical importance. This will help the readers in proper assessment and counselling of families.
Overall, this book is a valuable addition to the existing knowledge on paediatric nutrition. It deals with up-to-date scientific knowledge with evidences. All the topics have been covered well and supplemented with charts and figures wherever required. The only shortcoming is the absence of currently available statistics on various nutritional parameters from Asian countries including India like percentage of children with various grades of malnutrition, severe acute malnutrition, stunting, etc.
This book is recommended for all those who deal with paediatric nutrition including postgraduate students, paediatricians, nutritionists, researchers and policy makers.
