The effect of nutritional intervention in children with recurrent abdominal Henoch Schonlein purpura

Yunfen TIAN; Chunhui TANG; Xiaoxiao DUAN

ABSTRACT

Objective:

To investigate the nutritional risk and the incidence of malnutrition in children with recurrent abdominal Henoch Schonlein purpura(HSP), and observe the changes in the incidence of malnutrition after nutritional intervention.

Methods:

We retrospectively analyzed 90 children diagnosed with recurrent HSP in our hospital from 2017 to 2019.The cases were divided into two groups according to whether nutritional intervention was performed.The cases from January 2017 to May 2018 were chosen as the control group( n=42), and the cases from June 2018 to December 2019 were chosen as the experimental group( n=48). Based on the treatment of the primary disease, the high nutritional risk cases in experimental group were treated with extensively hydrolysed infant formula for nutritional intervention.The children were evaluated for nutritional risk with the STRONGkids nutrition tool.According to the score results, they were divided into high nutritional risk group and medium nutritional risk group.The Z score was used to evaluate malnutrition, and the degree of malnutrition was compared at admission and discharge.

Results:

Eighty-one children (90.0%) with recurrent abdominal allergic purpura had a high nutritional risk, 9 cases (10.0%)had a medium nutritional risk.There was no significant difference in the incidence of moderate and severe malnutrition between experimental group and control group at admission[39.6% (19/48) vs.40.5% (17/42), P>0.05]. The incidence of moderate and severe malnutrition in control group was higher than that in experimental group at discharge[66.7% (28/42) vs.22.9% (11/48), P<0.05].

Conclusion:

In children with recurrent abdominal HSP, due to severe gastrointestinal symptoms and a high incidence of high nutritional risk, nutritional intervention with extensively hydrolysed infant formula can avoid the occurrence or aggravation of iatrogenic malnutrition during hospitalization.