What is clinical nutrition? Understanding the epistemological foundations of a new discipline

Clinical Nutrition ESPEN
Diana Cardenas

Abstract

Although the therapeutic and economic efficacy of nutrition has been proven, optimal nutritional care is still scarce among hospital and ambulatory patients. Thus malnutrition is still highly prevalent. We identify as an underlying cause the absence of a common understanding of clinical nutrition as a discipline. The aim of this paper is to establish the epistemological foundations of clinical nutrition and to characterize it as a science. From the standpoint of historical epistemology, we examine the historical conditions that determine i) the main object of knowledge, ii) the nature and iii) domain of this science. Our hypothesis is that clinical nutrition as a science was formed in the second half of the twentieth century as an outcome of the integration of medicine and nutrition and underpinned by a primary transformation of the "nutrient" concept. We identify malnutrition as the primary practical and research domain of knowledge. Clinical nutrition is an autonomous empirical science that can be characterized as a basic and applied science. Its wide multi-disciplinarity guarantees its future.

Citations

Dec 16, 2020·Journal of Eating Disorders·Gabriella HerucKim Hurst
Mar 7, 2021·Nutrients·Ugo CucinottaValeria Dipasquale
May 21, 2021·Nutrition in Clinical Practice : Official Publication of the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition·Diana CardenasRocco Barazzoni
May 24, 2021·Clinical Nutrition : Official Journal of the European Society of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition·Diana CardenasRocco Barazzoni
Jun 13, 2021·JPEN. Journal of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition·Diana CardenasMaria Isabel Toulson Davisson Correia

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