Table 11.2 lists some of the more common diagnoses associated with failure to thrive. A more accurate description of this abnormal pattern of growth can be classified as inadequate intake, maldigestion, malabsorption, ineffective use of calories, or increased metabolic demand. Most failure to thrive, by Waterlow criteria, is marked by decreased weight for height, with initial sparing of height for age and head circumference for age, with gradual loss in height and head circumference for age as the undernourished state continues. As previously stated, caution must be used when weight gain consistently tracks below the third percentile, because this may reflect a normal growth pattern based on standard weight distribution patterns ( Fig. The term failure to thrive is a descriptive term used to depict inadequate weight gain over time, often used when weight for age crosses two percentile isopleths or when weight for age falls below the third percentile for age. Zitelli MD, in Zitelli and Davis' Atlas of Pediatric Physical Diagnosis, 2018 Failure to Thrive With thanks to Two Writing Teachers for the weekly Slice of Life invitation to write and to this writing community for unfailing encouragement.Basil J. Point being that of the baby, the child, the adult, the aged and infirm, which stands most able to impact the thriving of the human ecosystem… for better, for worse… with the power to discern, decide, desire, and do for one and all? Based on… love? Conscience? Overcoming fear? When my oldest son was in his early teens, he sighed: “I do not want to grow up.” (Of course he did he’s now a husband, a father, and his daughter is the joy of his days). In terms of the human, the matter of thriving-growing, growing up, growing old-involves willing interdependence. The businesslike science of staying alive. Stuck in nutrient-poor soil, it compensates by eating meat, the unwary flies which land in its toothy leaf-blades. A point of pain ripples outward, troubling the waters, sometimes over a great expanse… being alive, successfully, involves an array of coping mechanisms, the ability to adapt. Relationships fail to thrive, do they not.
In how many ways do we fail to thrive? In the course of being alive, what are the “nutrients” each individual needs to live well? Thriving in this sense goes beyond the physical to the psychological, mental, emotional, spiritual… can there be holistic balance if one part is suffering, starving? Because I’m an educator, this line of thinking brings me to “the whole child”: What is impeding growth? What “learning diet” does this individual child need? In the academic realm, nourishment for flourishment can vary widely… but at the core of being human, one non-negotiable need is each other. Which for me begs the question of all that’s in between.
Its potential can frame the beginning of one’s life, and, even if that life should be long, the end. Most often it’s applied to babies who don’t gain weight, who don’t grow as they should, due to a host of contributing factors.īoth ends of the spectrum, then, isn’t it, failure to thrive. Oh, I understand it’s medical terminology for geriatric deterioration, encompassing decreased appetite leading to poor nutrition, muscle weakness, dementia the human body can only take us so far.īut failure to thrive doesn’t happen only to the elderly. It doesn’t seem like failure to thrive to me. A voracious reader with a passion and ear for music, a grandmother generous with her love, time, and grace, a woman of great faith in God … her decline was slow and in the last days, she called out to deceased siblings and sang the hymns of her childhood. As on my mother-in-law’s certificate.īut I wonder: How can living to ninety-one be considered ‘failure to thrive’?Ī coal-miner’s daughter who survived the Great Depression, widowed twice with young children each time, who maintained a beautiful home and a bountiful table frequently laden and ready for the arrival of her family. I think about these words often, failure to thrive.