Nutritional assessment of children at Nepal Medical College Teaching Hospital

Abstract

Background: Child malnutrition is the single biggest contributor to under-five morbidity and mortality. Objectives: To assess the prevalence and types of malnutrition in children below 60 months of age, attending outpatient department at Nepal medical college teaching hospital in Attarkhel, Kathmandu, Nepal. Methods: A prospective study was carried out in five hundred and twelve children below 60 months of age from September 2010 to April 2011. Children detailed history, sex, weight were recorded and length/height were measured using standard technique. The length /height and weight were plotted on WHO centiles curves.1 The malnutrition were graded according to WHO classification. Result: Out of 512 children, according to WHO based on weight for age assessment , 148 (28.9%) were undernourished .Subsequently, in weight for height analysis, 73 (14.2%) were wasted and in height for age assessment, 64 (12.5%) were stunted. The present study also shows , 59 (11.5%), 50 (9.80%) and 14 (2.7%) children with acute, chronic and acute on chronic malnutrition. Conclusion: This study revealed that a high prevalence of undernutrition exists in Nepalese children. Overall, 28.9% children were undernourished. Illiteracy, large family size, not exclusively breast feeding, delayed weaning and low socio-economic status are the major risk factors for malnutrition.

Nutritional Status of Under-Five Children in Western Nepal

“…It is likely that the study popula ons enrolled were children a ending OPD of the hospital and can have acute food defi cit during the acute illness too. But the prevalence of was ng in this study is comparable to the similar study conducted by Rijal P who found 14.2 % of the children were wasted 8 . Similar study conducted in Oromia found that 16.3 % of the under fi ve children were stunted which was similar to the present study 13 .…”

“…Two studies conducted in Nigerian children in two diff erent se ngs also had a similar result with a higher prevalence of underweight in boys than in girls 6,7 . Similarly, higher prevalence of underweight in boys than girls was also noted in NDHS 2011 and a study conducted by Rijal P et al 2, 8 . This study further adds a small propor on (16.2%) of children aged 7 to 12 months to be underweight but it dras cally increased in the age group 37 to 48 months which has the highest prevalence of underweight (n= 16; 25%) followed by the age groups 25 to 36 months (n= 24; 24.7%).…”

A Study on Nutritional Status of Rural School going Children in Kavre District

“…2 There are a number of studies reporting the prevalence of thinness utilizing BMI for age as an indicator among Nepalese children. [5][6][7] In the present study, it was concluded that the prevalence of thinness among children was found to be 10.05% which was almost same as compared to the finding (12%) reported by Joshi et al among children of Kathmandu valley.…”

“…4 Although numerous studies were conducted to find out the prevalence of underweight, stunting, and thinness below the children of 5 years, [5][6][7] there were only limited studies conducted among the rest of the age group (5-16 years) in Nepalese children.…”

Ear Nose Throat (ENT) disorders in Government Schools of Far-Western Nepal

“…There are few studies in Nepal targe ng hospital based children or a certain disease only. 6,7,8,9 The main goal of the current study was to determine the occurrence of ENT disorders among schoolchildren in a district of far-west Nepal.…”