Nutrition & Food Sciences

Clinical Nutrition

Clinical nutrition is nutrition of patients in health care. Clinical in this sense refers to the management of patients, including not only outpatients at clinics, but also (and mainly) inpatients in hospitals. It incorporates primarily the scientific fields of nutrition and dietetics. Among the routes of administration, the preferred means of nutrition is, if possible, oral administration. Alternatives include enteral administration (in nasogastric feeding) and intravenous (in parenteral nutrition).