Nutritional Status Assessment of Primary school ...

International Journal of Applied Research and Studies (iJARS) ISSN: 2278-9480 Volume 4, Issue 3 (March - 2015) www.ijars.in

Research Article

Nutritional Status Assessment of Primary school children in Udupi District Karnataka: A Cross Sectional Study Authors: 1

Dr.Sriram Chandramohan*, 2Dr.Javed Khan, 3Dr.Jain Raj. R

Address For correspondence: Lecturer , Department of Public Health , College of Health Sciences , Saudi Electronic University , Abha Branch , Kingdom of Saudi Arabia 3 Lecturer, Department of community medicine, Sree Ramakrishna medical college of Naturopathy and Yogic sciences, Kanyakumari district, India 1,2

Abstract: Children are the future of the country. In India, children under 15 years of age constitute about 40 percent of the population. School children constitute a large pool of children of this age group. Nutritional status is a major component of school health services. Malnutrition remains the world’s most serious health problem and the single biggest contributor to child mortality, nearly one third of the children in the developing world are either underweight or stunted and more than 30% of the developing world’s population suffers from micronutrient deficiencies. Aim: To Assess the Nutritional status of Primary School Children in a Selected school in Upudi District. Materials and Methods: A Cross sectional study was conducted in a selected primary schools and the nutritional status of fifth standard students were assessed. Results: Out of 76 children assessed, 39 children (51%) were underweight and only one male student was overweight (1%). Conclusion: The nutritional status of the students in our study is not that satisfactory and there are more cases of under nourishment that need immediate attention. At the same time, there is a need to deal with overweight in school children in order to prevent the noncommunicable diseases. Keywords: Undernourishments, Primary School Children, Nutritional Assessment, Upudi District.

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I. INTRODUCTION The health of children is of fundamental importance in every country. The school children population approximate one –fifth of the total population and forms the future hope of the Nation. “Health of the children is the wealth of the nation”. The school age period is nutritionally significant because this is the prime time to build up body stores of nutrients in preparation for rapid growth of adolescence.[1] Malnutrition continues to be a primary cause of ill health and mortality among children in developing countries. It is a major public health problem and accounts for about half of all child deaths worldwide.[2] The prevalence of undernourishment in the developing world is16%, slightly less than the 18% in 2009. Twothirds of the developing countries’ undernourished people live in just seven countries: Bangladesh, China, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, and Pakistan; more than 40%livein China and India alone. [3] Food insecurity can negatively affect educational attainment in many ways. A known pathway is through high rates of school absenteeism: children from food-insecure households are pulled out of school to engage in productive activities in order to earn money. In the concerned environment of caregivers to provide proper food children might also suffer from a significant amount of psychological and emotional stress. These events often affect their cognitive and behavioral performances as adolescents. Such behaviors are incompatible with their school attendance.[4] The best global indicator of children’s well being is growth. Poor growth is attributable to a range of factors closely linked to overall standards of living and the ability of populations to meet their basic needs, such as access to food, housing and health care. Assessment of growth is the single measurement that best defines the nutritional and health status of children, and provides an indirect measurement of the quality of life of the entire population. The present study was undertaken to assess the nutritional status of primary schoolchildren in Upudi District Karnataka. II. OBJECTIVES To Assess the Nutritional status of Primary School Children in a Selected school in Upudi District. Research Questions: What is the Nutritional status of the Primary School children in Upudi district? III. MATERIALS AND METHODS Study design: A cross sectional study Sampling methods: The list of the 8 Primary Schools was obtained from the Office of the District Educational Officer. By simple random sampling technique, 6 Schools were selected for the study. All the six primary schools were approached for conducting the study but permission was given to conduct the study in one school only. Only students from fifth standard were assessed for nutritional status. There were 100 students in the fifth standard in that school but only 76 students were assessed. Some students were absent and others were not Manuscript Id: iJARS/1064 Authors Copy; Restricted to Personal Use Only any manipulation will be against copy Right Policy @ iJARS

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physically well so they were excluded from the study. The schools were informed well in advance and were provided with all the information about the study and consent was taken from the respective school principal. Inclusion criteria: - Children of age group of 9-11 years. (5th Standard students). - All those who were present on the day of examination Exclusion criteria: - Children those who were absent on the day of examination. Study variables: - Socio-demographic variables (Age, Sex,) - Nutritional status (Height, Weight) Tools of the study: The personal details such as age and gender were collected and the children date of birth was collected from the school records and matched with their age. Anthropometric measures: a) Weight: The weight of the child was recorded with the help of weighing machine with precision up to 100 grams. The weight of the study subjects was measured with minimum clothing, standing on weighing machine bearing equal weight on both foot. Accuracy of the weighing machine was checked before starting the study. b) Height: The height was measured while the child was standing by the side of a wall upright with heels close to each other and arm hanging by the side of the body. The height was measured from head to heels by an ordinary measuring tape. c) Nutritional Status: The Nutritional Status was assessed by (Center for Disease control & Prevention) CDC BMI-for-age growth charts for girls and boys. Data was entered into Microsoft® Excel® and body mass index (BMI) was calculated. Table I: Translated BMI number into a percentile for a child's sex and age. The Nutritional grading was done using percentages. Weight Status Category Underweight Healthy weight Overweight Obese

Percentile Range Less than the 5th percentile 5th percentile to less than the 85th percentile 85th to less than the 95th percentile Equal to or greater than the 95th percentile

Statistical Analysis: Data were entered in Microsoft Excel and analyzed using statistical software SPSS 16.0. The data were analyzed by using descriptive statistics. Measures of central tendency and measures of dispersion were used to represent the obtained data.


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IV. RESULTS A total of 76 students from a selected primary school in Upudi district in Karnataka comprised the study sample. There were 42 males (55%) and 34(45%) females [Table II]. The mean age of the students was 9.9 years and the mean height and weight were 126.9 cm and 22.3kg respectively. The Mean BMI among the study participants was 13.8. [Table IV]. All the students in the study were from fifth standard. Undernourishment was seen in 39 (51%) children, while overweight was seen in only one male student (2%) respectively Undernourishment was more common in boys (55%) than in girls (47%). [Table III]. Table II: Socio demographic profile of students Variable Sex

Category Male Female 09 10 11

Age (years)

Number 42 34 20 40 16

Percentage(%) 55 45 26 53 21

Table III: Gender – Wise Distribution of Nutritional Status (N= 76) Nutritional Status Male Female

Normal 18 (43%) 18(53%)

Under Weight 23 (55%) 16 (47%)

Over Weight 01(2%) 0

Table IV: Anthropometric Measurements Expressed as Mean and Standard Deviation

Age-wise distribution of students ( years) Weight-wise distribution of students (kg) Height-wise distribution of students(centimeters) BMI-wise distribution of students

N

Mean

Standard Deviation (SD)

Minimum

Maximum

76

9.9

0.69

09

11

76

22.3

4.07

13

40

76

126.9

7.83

106

141

76

13.8

1.52

10.9

20.4


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V. DISCUSSION The prevalence of undernourishment in the study was found to be 51%, which is much higher than that found by a similar study conducted by Francis et al,[5] in Jos North Local Government Area of Plateau State, Nigeria. Another study conducted by Chandra et al,[6] in the villages of Dharwad and Haliyal taluks reported 44.4% of children as underweight, which is more than that found in our study. A study done among Jenukuruba tribal children by Prabhakar et al,[7] also revealed high prevalence of mild (41.5%) and severe (6.7%) stunting and high prevalence of mild (40%) and severe (3.7%) wasting; they also reported 45.2% of children as having moderate underweight and 14.8% as having severe underweight. These figures indicate a higher prevalence of under nutrition than in our study population. Undernourishment was observed among 55% boys and 47 % girls in our study. In a similar study conducted by Raja et al,[8] in the primary schools of Nandigram area of Purba Medinipur district, West Bengal, they found an overall (age combined) prevalence of thinness of 62.9% and 61.6% in boys and girls, respectively. Another study conducted by Banerjee et al.[9] in the mining belt in northern rural Goa reported that 37.8% of the boys and 27.5% of the girls in their sample were underweight which is lesser than our current study. A similar study done by Hassan et al,[10] in the government schools in Azad Nagar area of Bangalore reported the prevalence of malnutrition in males and females as 57.94% and 42.06%, respectively which is slightly higher than our current study prevalence among boys but lesser prevalence among girls. One limitation of our study is that data on the socioeconomic status of the students were not collected. In order to get details of the socioeconomic status there is a need for a community-based study. VI. CONCLUSION A total 76 students from a selected primary school participated in our study. Out of 76 children , 39 children (51%) were underweight and only one male student was overweight (1%). VII. RECOMMENDATIONS   

A regular health check up should be organized by school authority in coordination of teachers and parents. Health education should be given to the children and parents about nutritional deficiencies and infections. Teachers should be trained to identify the common symptoms of nutritional deficiencies and other common morbidities in school children and take necessary measures for the same.

REFERENCES: 1. Kumari, S and R Jain 2005.assesment of school children from rural Bihar.Ind J.Nutr.Dietct, 42:326-334). 2. UNICEF (2004), State of World’s Children, 2004.


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3. The State of Food Insecurity in the World: Addressing food insecurity in protracted crises, Food and Agriculture Organization Report 2010. Available from: http://www.fao.org/docrep/013/ i1683e/i1683e.pdf [Last accessed on February 2015]. 4. Belachew T, Hadley C, Lindstrom D, Gebremariam A, Lachat C, Kolsteren P. Food insecurity, school absenteeism and educational attainment of adolescents in Jimma Zone Southwest Ethiopia: A longitudinal study. Nutr J 2011;10:1-9. 5. Francis A, Seline O, Angela O. Nutritional Status of Newly Enrolled Primary Schoolchildren in Jos-Plateau, Nigeria. Pak J Nutr 2010;9:1166-70. 6. Chandra KR, Padennavar UM, Sadashivappa T, Prabhakara GN. Nutrition Assessment Survey of Schoolchildren of Dharwad and Haliyal Taluks, Karnataka state, India. Kathmandu Univ J Sci Engg Technol 2006;2:1-19. 7. Jai Prabhakar SC, Gangadhar MR. Nutritional Status of Jenukuruba Tribal Children in Mysore District, Karnataka. Anthropologist 2009;11:83-8. 8. Chakraborty R, Bose K. Very high prevalence of thinness using new international body mass index cut off points among 5-10 year old schoolchildren of nandigram, west Bengal, India. J Res Med Sci 2009;14:129-33. 9. Banerjee S, Dias A, Shinkre R, Patel V. Under-nutrition among adolescents: A survey in five secondary schools in rural Goa. Natl Med J India 2011;24:8-11. 10. Hasan I, Zulkifle M. A Study of prevalence of malnutrition in government Schoolchildren in the field area of Azad nagar Bangalore, India. India. Glob JSci Front Res2010;10(7: 43 46.


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