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Catch-up growth: implications for the preterm and term infant

European Journal of Clinical Nutrition volume 64, pages S8–S10 (2010)Cite this article

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The fundamental principle underlying nutritional support is that intake meets the requirements, thereby ensuring the best outcome. When intake does not meet the requirements, a nutrient deficit is accrued and growth failure ensues. To ‘recover’ or ‘catch-up’, intake must not only meet the requirements for maintenance and normal growth but also replace the accrued nutrient deficit.

Growth failure is more common during infancy than during any other stage of life because programmed growth rates and, therefore, nutritional requirements are high. Even short periods of nutritional deprivation may have lasting effects on health, leading to the idea that there are critical periods of growth that, if missed, may not be recoverable (Dobbing, 1990b). In effect, poor growth can be directly related to poorer neurodevelopment, both in preterm (Ehrenkranz et al., 2006) and term infants (Heinonen et al., 2008).

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  1. Department of Pediatrics, University of St Louis, St Louis, MO, USA

    R J Cooke

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  1. R J Cooke
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Correspondence to R J Cooke.

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Competing interests

RJ Cooke has received lecture fees from Nutricia Ltd and Nestle Ltd, as well as grant support from Nestle Ltd.

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Cooke, R. Catch-up growth: implications for the preterm and term infant. Eur J Clin Nutr 64 (Suppl 1), S8–S10 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/ejcn.2010.40

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