Background: Malnutrition is considered one of the most serious complications of CLD.
Aim Of the Work: The aim of this study was to assess the nutritional status of children with chronic liver diseases (CLD) using bioelectrical impending analysis (BIA) and anthropometric measurements.
Patients and methods: This work was conducted as a cross sectional study and included 103 children with CLD. The included children were classified into 2 groups; group (1) which included 62 patients with mid upper arm circumference >5th percentile and group (2): included 41 patients with mid upper arm circumference ≤5th percentile. Each child underwent: full history taking, thorough clinical examination, and anthropometry measuring and bio electrical impedance analysis.
Results: There were statistically significant differences between group 1 and group 2 as regard the median of Egyptian Z score of weight, height and body mass index (P-value= 0.006, 0.001 and 0.019, respectively). There were statistically significant differences between group 1 than group 2 as regard the median values of fat range percent, fat mass, fat free mass, body water percent, bone mass and phase angle which were higher in group 1 than group 2 (P-value= 0.001, 0.001, 0.001, 0.001, 0.001 and 0.001, respectively). Conclusion: Anthropometric parameters can be used for assessment of nutritional status in children with CLD .Bioelectrical impedance analysis is an effective tool for evaluation of nutritional state of CLD children.