Publication:

Nutritional status and its influencing factors among adolescents in rural field practice area of a medical college in Karnataka, India

Background Good nutrition and dietary behavior are important during adolescence to achieve full growth potential and appropriate body composition and to promote health and well-being. Thus, the present study was conducted in order to assess the nutritional status and its influencing factors among the school going adolescents.

Methods A cross sectional study was conducted among the school going adolescents (Class V to Class X) in the rural field practice area of Sri Siddhartha Medical College, Tumkur from June 2015 to May 2016. Representative sample was drawn proportionately from each of the strata (school, class and gender). Anthropometric measurements, dietary assessment and clinical examination of study participants were made, and other information was collected using semi structured questionnaire. BMI-for-age and height-for-age were considered as the indicators and WHO Anthroplus software was used to calculate and assess the nutritional status. Statistical analysis was performed using SPSS version 16.

Results The prevalence of thinness and stunting were 32.3% and 25.8% respectively. The prevalence of overweight was 4.8%. The risk of malnutrition was significantly high among adolescents from BPL families, larger family size and the birth order of three and more (p <0.05).

Conclusions There is an immediate need to address the high burden of under-nutrition in adolescents of both sexes in schools by routine annual monitoring of nutritional status, appropriate management of affected child, providing nutritional counselling for underweight adolescents.