How healthy are preschool children? A community-based cross-sectional study

Abstract

Background: India is home to a major proportion of children under five years of age and has been facing challenges to improvise their health including nutritional status. The study conducted with objectives to find out the nutritional status of children of under-five age and knowledge of mothers on malnutrition. Method: A community based cross-sectional study was conducted in a town of Gujarat. Child ren between age group of 1 to 5 years were participants for the study of selected Anganwadi. The inclusion criteria for study participants were the participants to be residents of the selected Anganwadis area and the age limit for the children was set to less than or equal to five years. Total 390 children and 325 mothers participated in study. After obtaining ethical approval, data was collected from the Anganwadis and analysed. Result: Major findings showed that most children (66.6%) were of first order of birth, majority (77%) weighed between 2.5-3.4 kgs at birth, 94% were exclusively breast fed upto six months of age. About 20% of them suffered from morbidity in last six months. Anthropometric measurement showed that 88% of children in green zone and 82% of children had midarm circumference is more than 13.5 cm. Conclusion: Thus study conclude that malnutrition in town was below national average. The role of health staff was found proactive.

Keywords

• feeding practices
• malnutrition
• nutritional status
• weight for age