Tube feeding is commonly used as a method of giving children nutrition while they are being treated for disease. While this is an effective way of ensuring a child thrives and grows, research studies and clinical experience have shown that long-term oral feeding difficulties often arise when the child no longer requires tube feeding. This article gives a critical review of the literature on tube feeding and its effect on normal eating and drinking skills. While few studies have followed a rigorous research design, there is enough literature to identify a number of factors which may be implicated in later feeding difficulties and which therefore need further exploration in research studies. These factors include age at which oral feeding commences, medical complications, exposure to taste and textures during sensitive periods, aversive experiences, and different methods of delivering tube feeds.

Purpose of ReviewA sensitive period in development is one in which it is easier for learning to take place; the behaviour can however still be learned at a later stage, but with more difficulty. This is in contrast to a critical period, a time at which a behaviour must be learned, and if this window of opportunity is missed, then the behaviour can never be acquired. Both might determine food acceptance in childhood.Recent FindingsThere is evidence to support the idea of a sensitive period for the introduction of tastes, a critical period for the introduction of textures and for the development of oral motor function, and a possible critical period for the introduction of new foods but only in children where there is an innate disposition to develop early and extreme disgust responses.SummaryThere are both sensitive and critical periods in the acquisition of food preferences.