Assessment of anaemia in adolescent girls

Abstract

Background: The world’s adolescent population is facing a series of serious nutritional challenges which are not only affecting their growth and development but also their livelihood as adults. Yet, adolescents remain a largely neglected, difficult to measure and hard to reach population, in which the needs of adolescent girls in particular, are often ignored. Anemia in adolescent girls contributes to maternal and foetal mortality and morbidity in future. The objective of the study was to estimate the frequency of anemia among adolescent girls, to study the socio-demographic factors associated with anemia and to evaluate the cause and type of anaemia.Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted in an urban area in a school. A total of 300 girls (12-18 years) were included in this study. Statistical analysis was done using percentage, standard error of proportion, Chi-square test and student’s t-test.Results: The prevalence of anemia was found to be 90%. A significant association of anemia was found with socio-economic status and literacy status of parents. Mean height and weight of subjects with anemia was significantly less than subjects without anemia. A high prevalence of anemia among adolescent females was found, among those whose parents were less educated.Conclusions: The overall prevalence of anemia among adolescent females was found to be 90%. There is significant association of anemia with socio-economic status and parents' educational status. There is need to increase awareness of anemia in adolescent girls and parents.

An Analysis of Societal Determinant of Anemia among Adolescent Girls in Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Pakistan

“…e children of educated parents consume ironrich food, utilize adequate healthcare facilities, and manage hygienic household environment, which can be associated with reduction in anemia among adolescent girls. e findings are consistent with the studies [31,32], which reported that children of highly educated parents have lesser predisposition to develop anemia. Economic well-being of girls determined based on the father's, mother's, and family monthly revealed that all the independent variables are significantly associated with the prevalence of anemia among girls.…”

“…Parental, household, and community factors are associated with anemia [25,[31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41]. e findings of our study elucidated that prevalence of anemia was smaller among girls whose parents had attained more than 12 years of education.…”

Socioeconomic determinants of severe anemia and assessment for iron and vitamin B12 deficiency among anemic adolescents

“…Also mean BMI was low in severely anemic subjects as compared to mild-moderate anemic group. This finding is in agreement with Upadhyay et al, Talpan et al & Hanan et al [9,13,14]. Low BMI in severe anemia suggests that anemia affects the overall growth of adolescents.…”

“…According to NFHS 3 more than 39% adolescent girls are mildly anemic while 15 % and 2% have moderate and severe anemia respectively [3]. Similarly 2% to 4% prevalence of severe anemia was noted by other authors too [8][9][10]. Ours was a hospital based study which can be the reason of high prevalence of severe anemia.…”

A study of anaemia and its correlates among adolescent girls in schools of Haldwani, India

“…Majority of girls 266 (34.55%) in present study were mildly anaemic and this is consistent with findings of Siva PM et al in Kerala, Singla N et al in Ludhiana, Upadhye JV et al in Nagpur and other studies in different parts of India where mild anaemia is found to be most prevalent. [9][10][11] Using HCS, Verma R et al found similar magnitude of problem of anaemia among adolescents including boys in Rohtak. 12 However, in a study by Deshpande NS et al in Pune, majority had moderate anaemia.…”