Rationale.

Nursing personnel plays several and important roles within the nutritional therapy multidisciplinary teams (NTMT) regarding implementation, management and supervision of nutritional therapy (NT). However, current Nursing practices in nutritional therapy (NT) administered in Latin American (LA) countries are not well documented.

Objective.

To document the current state of Nursing practices followed with NT administered in LA countries.

Study design.

Cross-sectional, descriptive.

Study location.

Fifty hospitals in the capitol-cities of eight LA countries. The survey was conducted during the month of November 2019.

Methods.

By means of an anonymous survey distributed through Survey Monkey™ platform (SurveyMonkey LLC, Palo Alto, California, United States) among Nursing professionals dedicated to TN in participating hospitals existence of a NTMT (or any other form of hospital organization) dedicated to NT administration, exclusive dedication of their members to NT provision, existence of legislations on NT provision, activities performed by Nursing personnel as part of the NTMT, existence of proprietary protocols for nutritional assessment of the patient, NT administration, and nutritional education of patients and relatives upon hospital discharge; and monitoring of NT quality indicators, management of risks related with NT, and local formation in NT issues were documented.

Results.

Ninety-five percent of participating institutions has a NTMT, but 55 % of the respondents are dedicated to NT provision in an exclusive manner. Half of the respondents knew of nationally existent legislations on NT. Sixty-five percent of the surveyed Nursing personnel delivers NT as part of the care of critically ill patients and those convalescing after surgery. Seventy-seven percent of Nursing personnel conducts hospital NT schemes according with locally-derived protocols. Likewise, 62 % of participating nurses rely on local protocols for education of patients and relatives upon discharge. Only 52 % of the respondents use recognized indicators to measure the quality of administered TN. There are protocols for managing risk associated with NT in only 45 % of participating hospitals. Barely half of the participating centers offer education activities in NT. Less than half of the surveyed nurses show a postgrad degree on NT.

Conclusions.

Not all the hospitals in AL have a NTMT. Participation of Nursing professionals in them is not exclusive. There are unmet needs of education programs in NT for Nursery personnel. NT protocols should be drafted and implemented in keeping with “Best Practices”, and for monitoring of Nursery activities by means of recognized indicators.

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