Published 13 November 2008, doi:10.1136/bmj.a2180
Cite this as: BMJ 2008;337:a2180

Clinical Review

Management of acute moderate and severe childhood malnutrition

Mark J Manary, professor, Heidi L Sandige, instructor

1 Department of Pediatrics, Washington University School of Medicine, St Louis, MO 63110, USA

Correspondence to: M J Manary manary@kids.wustl.edu

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Acute childhood malnutrition affects about a tenth of the world’s children under 5 years of age, particularly those living in circumstances of extreme poverty in the developing world.1 2 Malnutrition is typically the result of an inadequate diet and is one of the most common diagnoses in children in health facilities in sub-Saharan Africa and south Asia. Acute childhood malnutrition leads to greater risk of death or disability from common paediatric illnesses such as pneumonia and diarrhoeal disease, and it shapes long term health by compromising physical and intellectual development.3 The condition carries a case fatality rate of 5-60%.4 5 This review describes how best to manage cases of acute childhood malnutrition in light of recent changes in standard recommendations.


We searched Medline for the terms "moderate malnutrition", "severe malnutrition", "supplementary feeding", and "therapeutic feeding", limiting the search to children. We utilised a personal archive of references, specifically concerning recent recommendations or . . . [Full text of this article]



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