Nutritional Status of Pediatric Patients Newly Diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia at an Institute of Reference in Oncology of Rio de Janeiro

Abstract

Introduction: Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is the most common neoplasm in pediatrics, and nutritional assessment is an essential tool for understanding patients' health conditions. The present study aimed to evaluate and describe the nutritional status of pediatric patients newly diagnosed with ALL and to verify the relation between body mass index for age (BMI-for-Age) and other anthropometric measurements. Method: A cross-sectional, observational study was performed with patients from 1 to 18 years of age, newly diagnosed with ALL, from January 2004 to December 2009. The data collected were age, body weight, height, triceps skinfold (TS), arm circumference (AC) and arm muscle circumference (AMC). The BMI was calculated and the BMI-for-age classification used in the analysis. Pearson's Chi-square test and Fisher's exact test were used to analyze the association between anthropometric parameters. Results: 54 patients were included in the study. The classification of "adequate nutritional status" was the most frequent in all anthropometric parameters. In addition, we observed that the association of nutritional status by AMC with BMI-for-Age (p=0.001) shows that the BMI-for-Age may be adequate for classification of pediatric patients with ALL at diagnosis. In addition, AC agreement with AMC (p=0.01) of 43% (p=0.001) also confirmed the use of ac versus AMC, as it is a simpler measure. Conclusion: In the studied population the nutritional status was preserved. Just as the association of AMC with BMI-for-Age, AC has been shown to be a sensitive parameter for classifying  eutrophy.