Hospital-based nutrition intervention in India practical issues Sarath Gopalan Consultant in Clinical Nutrition and Pediatric Gastroenterology, Pushpawati Singhania Research Institute for Liver, Renal and Digestive Diseases (PSRI), New Delhi, Executive Director, Centre for Research on Nutrition Support Systems New Delhi and Secretary, Indian Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition (ISPEN) Over the years, the field of Medicine has been associated with the growth of varied clinical specialities and subspecialities. However, in India, hospital-based nutrition intervention which has immense potential does not appear to have received the same attention. It must be appreciated that hospital-based nutrition and Community Nutrition are the two ends of the spectrum and in a developing society, both these aspects must be given due importance. There is an urgent need in India today that health care and nutrition support be given the topmost priority in order to ensure that optimal nutrition support is made available to those who need it most. Till date, most of the evidence in literature has cited the superiority of commercial over kitchen-based enteral preparations from the point of contamination. In India, the kitchen-based approach has been used successfully even in large corporate hospitals. A practical approach calls for a judicious combination of both kitchen-based and commercial enteral preparations keeping in mind the cost. From "The 7th Congress of the PENSA Abstract Book" Bali, Indonesia, August 24-26, 2001 Page : 32