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Abstract Background: Congenital heart disease (CHD) accounts for more infant deaths than all other congenital defects put together. It is a popular view that children with congenital heart disease are often small and undernourished. Infants with CHD are prone to malnutrition for several reasons including decreased energy intake, increased energy requirements, or both. The severity of malnutrition can range from mild under-nutrition to failure to thrive. This can have a notable effect on the outcome of surgery, increasing morbidity and mortality. Different types of cardiac malformations can affect nutrition and growth to varying degrees. The maintenance of nutritional homeostasis is fundamental to normal health. Objective: Assessment of nutritional status and growth centiles of pediatric patients with CHD at Cairo University Hospital before and after cardiac surgery or interventional cardiac catheterization. Results: In the current study, 40 patients with CHD (27 acyanotic and 13 cyanotic) with their age ranged from 1 month to 12 years, 21 female and 19 male, underwent corrective procedure (therapeutic catheterization and surgery). Our patients showed marked decrease of weight (mean 9.08 ± 6.84), height (mean 76.45 ± 21.15) and BMI (mean 13.41 ± 2.52) before correction of malformations. Significant (p value < 0.001) early somatic catch up growth in the following anthropometric measurements; weight, height and BMI was documented. There was severe somatic growth deceleration below 10th percentile it was more pronounced in the cyanotic group of patients, 50% and 86% of them were below the 10th percentile for Wt. and Ht. respectively. Conclusion: We concluded that Infants with CHD are prone to malnutrition, thorough nutritional assessment by anthropometric measures is important for appropriate nutrition care of the pediatric CHD patient |