The effect of the Aksi Bergizi program on hemoglobin levels in adolescent girls at a junior high school

Abstract

The Nutritional Action initiative, launched by UNICEF Indonesia, addresses low compliance with iron supplement consumption among adolescent girls and the high prevalence of anemia. This program was first implemented in Klaten and West Lombok districts in 2018 and expanded nationwide in 2022–2023. The purpose of this quantitative study is to evaluate Nutritional Action's impact on hemoglobin levels in seventh-grade girls at junior high school using a pre-experimental, one-group pretest-posttest design. A stratified random sampling technique was applied, resulting in 44 respondents meeting the inclusion criteria of seventh-grade girls aged 12–14. Data analysis included univariate and bivariate analyses, with the Wilcoxon test used for significance testing. Among the participants, 37 (84%) experienced an increase in hemoglobin levels, while 7 (16%) showed no change in levels before and after the intervention. The analysis yielded a p-value of 0.0001, indicating a significant effect of Nutritional Action on the hemoglobin levels of seventh-grade girls at junior high school.

Keywords

• Anemia
• early adolescent girls
• hemoglobin levels
• iron supplement tablets
• nutritional status