Nutrition and Its Impact on Psychosocial Child Development: Perspective on Preterm Infants

INTRODUCTION:The profound impact of nutrition on the early growth and body composition of low birthweight (LBW) infants is well known. Emerging evidence supports the thesis that both the quantity and quality of nutrients delivered in early life to LBW infants affects infant and child development and underlines the need for a renewed emphasis on optimizing early nutrition.

Intrauterine and postnatal growth restrictions are associated with a myriad of adverse outcomes in LBW infants, even at adolescence, including short stature, disproportionately small heads and sub-optimal weight in relation to age.In turn, deficits in growth have been associated with poor educational and cognitive outcomes,including low verbal and performance IQ scores and inappropriate receptive language, speech, reading, math, and spelling skills in children,or risk of schizophrenia.

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