Assessment of under nutrition with composite index of anthropometric failure (CIAF) among under-five children in a rural area of West Bengal, India

Abstract

INTRODUCTIONUnder-five children constitute the most vulnerable segment of any community. Their nutritional status is a sensitive indicator of community health and nutrition. Any major deviation in the nutrient intake, either in quality or in quantity from its requirement can affect growth in many ways. 1 Malnutrition among under-five children is an important public health problem in developing countries, and a major cause of morbidity and mortality in India. 2 Scarcity of suitable food, lack of purchasing power of the family, poor personal hygiene, inadequate knowledge regarding what the baby should ABSTRACT Background: Malnutrition among under-five children is an important public health problem in developing countries, and a major cause of morbidity and mortality in India, hence the present study was conducted to find out the nutritional status of under-five children and to elicit the factors associated with it. Methods: This community based cross-sectional study was conducted among 142 under-five children during May to June 2017 in the areas under the jurisdiction of Nasibpur Primary Health Centre, Singur, West Bengal, India. Data on socio-demographic characteristics, feeding habits and other biological factors were obtained from structured questionnaire, followed by anthropometric measurement. Assessment of nutritional status of the children was done with the help of Composite Index of Anthropometric Failure (CIAF). Descriptive statistics and logistic regression were performed to analyse the data by using SPSS version 16.0. Results: The mean (standard deviation) age of the sample was 28.4 (±15.2) months. About 36.1% children were found to have anthropometric failure using CIAF (wasting only 2.1%, wasting and underweight 14.5%, wasting, stunting and underweight 5.5%, stunting and underweight 6.3%, stunting only 4.9%, underweight only 2.8%). Education of mother [AOR = 3.6 (1.2-10.8)], birth order [AOR = 3.7 (1.4-9.9)], and exclusive breast feeding practice [AOR = 7.3 (2.9-18.1)] remained the significant correlates when adjusted with other variables in the multivariable analysis. Conclusions:The high prevalence of malnutrition in the community requires multipronged approach regarding nutritional education, intensive information education and communication (IEC) activities for exclusive breast feeding through antenatal clinics and adoption of family planning methods.

Composite Index of Anthropometric Failure (CIAF) among Sonowal Kachari tribal preschool children of flood effected region of Assam, India

“…Several studies have confirmed that girls have shown higher vulnerability in undernutrition than boys in Indian children (Bose et al 2007;Mondal and Sen 2010;Sen and Mondal 2012;Kramsapi et al 2018;Rengma et al 2016;Roy et al 2018;Debnath et al 2018). The high prevalence of undernutrition observed among children in the present investigation indicates a state of acute malnutrition which may be attributed to recent food deprivation and/or the higher prevalence of infectious diseases and socio-economic condition.…”

“…Kumar (Biswas et al 2018) and 75% in Pune, Maharashtra (Rasheed and Jeyakumar, 2018). The present investigation showed that the prevalence of wasting, underweight and stunting is lower than the children of other parts of the country like the Bauri caste children (Das and Bose, 2009), urban-slum children (Dewan et al 2015), children of Agra (Agarwal et al 2014), urban children of Midnapore (Sinha and Maiti 2012), Bankura district West Bengal (Patsa and Banerjee 2018), Karbi children, Assam (Kramsapi et al 2018), Kottayam, Kerala (Jayalakshmi and Jissa 2017), Rural West Bengal (Roy et al 2018), Pune, Maharastra (Rasheed and Jeyakumar 2018), South 24 Parganas, West Bengal (Biswas et al 2018) and Yemen (Al-Sadeeq et al 2019) (Table 5).…”

“…Anthropometry is a single most non-invasive and easy-to-use technique to assess the nutritional status in clinical and epidemiological investigation (WHO 1995;Hall et al 2007;Svedberg 2011). Several anthropometric measurements of lowheight-for-age (stunting), low-weightfor-age (underweight) and low-weightfor-height (wasting) were widely used to assess the magnitude of undernutrition (<−2SD) among preschool children (WHO 1995;Bose et al 2007;Mukhopadhyay et al 2009;Mondal and Sen 2010;Svedberg 2011;Sen and Mondal 2012;Savanur and Ghugre 2015;Jayalakshmi and Jissa 2017;Roy et al 2018;Kramsapi et al 2018;Rasheed and Jeyakumar 2018;Biswas et al 2018;Al-Sadeeq et al 2019;Tamaella et al 2019). Several researchers have advocated that these conventional anthropometric indices could extend beyond and may be unable to assess the actual magnitude of undernutrition in children (Svedberg 2000;Nandy et al 2005;Nandy and Miranda 2008;Nandy and Svedberg 2012).…”

“…Several researchers have advocated that these conventional anthropometric indices could extend beyond and may be unable to assess the actual magnitude of undernutrition in children (Svedberg 2000;Nandy et al 2005;Nandy and Miranda 2008;Nandy and Svedberg 2012). In order to determine the actual magnitude of undernutrition utilizing the conventional anthropometric measures (i.e., stunting, underweight and wasting) and to determine the magnitude of a child with multiple anthropometric failures with the Composite Index of Anthropometric Failures (CIAF) is proposed as more reliable anthropometric measure in preschool children (Nandy et al 2005;Nandy and Miranda 2008;Svedberg 2011;Nandy and Svedberg 2012;Savanur and Ghugre 2015;Jayalakshmi and Jissa 2017;Biswas et al 2018;Kramsapi et al 2018;Rasheed and Jeyakumar 2018;Roy et al 2018;Ziba et al 2018;Al-Sadeeq et al 2019;Tamaella et al 2019).…”

Evaluation of nutritional deficits among adolescents in Tando Muhammad Khan district via anthropometric measures

“…Despite the fact that these indices have been used by many researchers for assessment of child health and nutritional status, it is still under consideration to be entitled as the finest indicator of nutritional status. An appraisal of such sort would yield practically important implications 13 .…”