Overview
Nutrition is a critical component to therapy for young children with chronic diseases and medical conditions. Proper nutritional support prevents malnutrition, assures appropriate physical growth and development, and helps to maintain a strong immune system.
A pediatric registered dietitian is a licensed health professional who specializes in the nutritional care of children and understands their specific nutritional needs. Cleveland Clinic Children’s has a team of registered dietitians, board certified in pediatrics, who collaborate with physician teams to provide expert, evidence-based nutritional care for infants, children and adolescents.
The Pediatric Nutrition Support Team provides individual counseling to assess each child’s nutritional needs, develop the most appropriate plan of nutritional support, and monitor nutritional status to ensure an optimal outcome.
Through inpatient and outpatient settings, the Pediatric Nutrition Support Team at Cleveland Clinic Children’s offers:
- Comprehensive individualized nutritional and physical assessments.
- Evaluations of oral motor, sensory, and developmental feeding skills.
- In-depth family education related to nutritional needs and strategies, feeding techniques and equipment recommendations, home programming and community resources.
- Home monitoring and evaluation.
Our team will develop a comprehensive interdisciplinary plan, communicating internally with other medical care providers as necessary.
The mission of the Pediatric Nutrition Support Team is to provide exceptional nutrition care to infants, children, and adolescents through application of scientific and evidence-based research for optimal patient care. Our goal is to foster growth and development while creating a family-centered setting that is highly valued by our internal and external customers.
This is achieved by thorough evaluation of individuals’ needs, goal-oriented intervention implementation, facilitation, provision and delivery of nutrition – such as food, enteral and parenteral solutions, strict nutrition care monitoring, and the seamless transfer of care to outside providers. Through collaboration with other departments, we seek to identify and care for patients at nutrition risk.
What We Treat
- Age appropriate nutrition guidance.
- Bone marrow transplantation.
- Celiac disease.
- Conditions warranting enteral (digestive) and parenteral (non-digestive) nutrition support.
- Chronic kidney disease.
- Congenital heart defects.
- Constipation.
- Diabetes - Type 1 and Type 2.
- Diarrhea.
- Dietary counseling and surveillance.
- Eating disorders (anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, EDNOS).
- Failure to thrive.
- Fat malabsorption.
- Feeding problems and feeding aversions.
- Feeding issues related to developmental delay and behavioral issues.
- Food allergies.
- Fructose intolerance.
- Gastroesophageal reflux.
- Genetic disorders with poor growth.
- Hemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis.
- Home parenteral and enteral nutrition.
- Hypertension.
- Hypercholesterolemia.
- Infant feeding and transitional feeding from infancy and beyond.
- Inflammatory bowel disease (Crohn's, Ulcerative Colitis).
- Intestinal rehabilitation patients.
- Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).
- Ketogenic diet and modified Atkins diet for epilepsy disorders.
- Lactose intolerance.
- Liver failure.
- Malabsorption.
- Malnutrition.
- Metabolic disorders (including but not limited to phenylketonuria, urea cycle and fatty acid oxidation disorders and MSUD).
- Neonates with gastrointestinal complications/anomalies (omphalocele, gastroschisis, medical and surgical necrotizing enterocolitis, short bowel syndrome, GERD, Hirschprungs Disease).
- Neonates with metabolic bone disease, chronic lung disease, congenital heart disease and renal disease.
- Nutrition advice for picky eaters.
- Nutritional deficiencies.
- Oncology/Hematology.
- Overweight/obesity.
- Pancreatic insufficiency.
- Pancreatitis.
- Short bowel syndrome.
- Solid organ transplantation.
- Sports nutrition.
- Weight management.
Programs
Feeding Disorders Program
The Feeding Disorders Program takes a team approach to assessing the contributing factors to an infant or child's inability or refusal to eat, or when the child has difficulty eating. The patient and family will then receive an individualized combination of education, support and therapy.
Fit Youth
Fit Youth is a 12-week program designed to help children ages 7-16 years develop new eating and exercise habits. With the help of a psychologist, dietitian and exercise physiologist, parents and children will learn how to make adjustments at home to support healthy weight control.
Interdisciplinary Infant Nutrition Clinic
The focus of the infant nutrition clinic is on infants with feeding difficulties that are primarily physiologic or skill related in origin. Pediatric Registered Dietitians evaluate the infant’s nutritional needs and feeding skills individually with the goal of promoting optimal growth and development. The clinicians work toward transition to oral feeds while adjusting the diet as appropriate and working on feeding skills.
Dialysis Unit
Pediatric renal dietitians at The Power Dialysis Unit at the Children's Hospital for Rehabilitation specialize in the dietary needs of children with chronic kidney disease. The dietitians will educate parents and children about proper nutritional needs and develop an individualized feeding program to support the current state of the child’s health and his or her developmental needs.
Our Team
- Christina DeTallo, MS, MBA, RD, CSP, LD – Director, Pediatric Nutrition Support Team
- Andrea Adler, RD, CSP, CSPCC, LD
- Morgan Beemiller, RD, LD
- Evelyn Benden, MS, RD, CSP, LD
- Sara Bewley, MS, RD, CSP, LD
- Christine Bowen, RD, SP, LD
- Kristina Colling, MS, RD, CSP, LD
- Jennifer Hyland, RD, CSP, LD
- Bette Klein, MS, RD, CSP, LD
- Hanna Leikin, MS, RD, CSP, LD
- Merideth Miller, RD, CSP, LD
- Hillary Nason, MS, RD, LD
- Kaitlyn Nowacki, MS, RD, CSP, LD
Appointments
To schedule an appointment, please call 216.444.9000. You can also send us an email.
Resources
- When should I start and how much baby food should I feed my infant?
- What are typical portions of foods for my toddler?
- What should my preschooler be eating?
- My child was diagnosed with lactose intolerance. What is lactose intolerance? And what are the dietary restrictions?
- My child was found to have anemia or low iron. What are some common foods high in iron?
