ABSTRACT
Background: Good nutrition during adolescence is critical to cover the deficits suffered during childhood and should include nutrients required to meet the demands of physical and cognitive growth and development, provide adequate stores of energy for illnesses and pregnancy and prevent adult onset of nutrition-related diseases. Poorly nourished adolescent mothers are more likely to give birth to low birth weight babies, perpetuating a cycle of health problems which pass from one generation to the next. Therefore, this study was aimed to assess the nutritional status of school going adolescent girls of Agroha block of Haryana.Methods: Study area was two senior secondary and two high schools (randomly selected) of Agroha block of district Hisar (Haryana). Study design was school based cross-sectional study. Study participants were three hundred and forty-four adolescent girls studying in class 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th. Study tool was pre-designed and pre-tested questionnaire. Percentages and Chi- Square. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 20.0 was used.Results: Out of total girls, 8.72% were found to be thin followed by severely thin (0.58%). Thirteen (3.78%) girls were found to be overweight followed by obese (0.58%).Conclusions: Nutritional status of adolescent girls was found to be satisfactory.
ABSTRACT
Introduction: Anemia is a most common public healthproblem affecting around 1.9 billion population of the world.It is a severe public health problem in India. Medical studentsare vulnerable to develop anemia due to irregular eatinghabits due to hectic study schedule. Anemia among this agegroup has significant health consequences resulting in poorcognition, decreased attention span and memory affectingthe performance, depressed immunity, repeated infections,increased fatigue, and shortness of breath, dizziness, blurredvision, low endurance and irregular menstruation.Material and Methods: This study is conducted among 100students of both gender taking admission in MBBS first yearat MAMC, Agroha. Hemoglobin values and other relevantdetails of the students were taken from academic sectionsubmitted at time of admission. World Health Organizationcriteria were taken to determine the severity of anemia.Modified B.G. Prasad scale was used to assess the socioeconomic status of the family. Data was first entered into MSexcel sheet and then was exported to SPSS version 20.0 forappropriate analysis.Results: Prevalence of anemia came out to be 54% amongstudy subjects. Difference between the mean levels ofhemoglobin across the genders came out be statisticallysignificant (P=<0.001).Conclusion: Prevalence of anemia is high among the studysubjects with more prevalence among females study subjects.There is a need to accelerate efforts for achieving control ofanemia by strengthening multi-sectoral partnership involvinggovernment departments, academic institutions, bilateralagencies and food industry.