Nutrition and Epstein-Barr viremia in children underwent liver transplantation: a retrospective, cross-sectional study

Background and Aims We aimed to examine the association between nutritional status, assessed by height/length and body weight for age and sex, and Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) viremia in children underwent liver transplantation. Methods Nutritional status was determined by total score of age- and sex-specific height/length and body weight: < (-2 SD) as “2 points”, (-2 SD to -1 SD) as “1 point”, and ≥ (-1SD) as “0 point”. Children were further classified into three groups: malnutrition (4 points), risk of malnutrition (1 to 3 points), and normal (0 point). EBV viremia were confirmed by real time quantitative PCR method if EBV burden was ≥400 copies/ml. Results A total number of 896 children (414 boys and 482 girls, medium age 8 months) were included in the study. The medium height was 65.0 cm while medium body weight was 7.0kg. The prevalence of EBV viremia was 54.6% during follow up. Comparing with children with normal nutritional status, the adjusted odds ratios for the risk of EBV viremia was 2.14 (95% CI: 1.44, 3.19) in children with risk of malnutrition, and 2.29 (95% CI: 1.54, 3.40) in children with malnutrition. Each point increase of nutritional score was associated with a 21% higher risk of EBV viremia (odd ratios=1.21; 95% CI: 1.10, 1.34) in fully adjusted model. Conclusions Nutritional score was associated with EBV viremia in children underwent liver transplantation.