Nutrition Assessment
The nutritional care process, you would realize, begins with nutritional assessment. Nutrition assessment is the evaluation of an individual's nutritional status and nutrient requirements. It is a systematic process of obtaining, verifying, and interpreting data in order to make decisions about the nature and cause of nutrition-related problems. It is an ongoing, dynamic process that involves not only initial data collection, but also continual reassessment and analysis of patients/clients/ groups needs. The purpose of nutrition assessment is to:
Obtain adequate information in order to identify nutrition-related problems,
Define accurately an individual's nutritional status,
Determine the level of nutritional support that individuals need, and
Monitor changes in the nutritional status and the effect of nutritional intervention.