ABSTRACT
Background: Globally diarrhoea remains the second leading cause of mortality among children of below five years age. Objective was to find out the prevalence of diarrhoea and child care practices associated with diarrhoea in under five children of tea garden workers of Jorhat district, Assam. Methods: A community based cross sectional study was conducted among the under five children of selected tea gardens of Jorhat district of Assam, India from July 2017 to June 2018. Results: Prevalence of diarrhoea among the study participants in last 2 weeks was found to be 26.4%. Out of 315 study participants, 24.1% belonged to the age group of 12-24 months, 55.2% were males. Exclusive breast feeding was recorded in 95.9% of the children. Prevalence of diarrhoea was less among exclusively breast fed children 25.5% as compared to not exclusively breastfed 46.1%. Health advice during diarrhea was sought by 97.8% of the respondents. Available records showed almost all of the children 99.3% got vaccinated with measles vaccine and contrary to this majority 64.4% study participants had not received Rota virus vaccination. Conclusions: Diarrhoea is still a significant public health problem among fewer than five children of tea garden workers with low Rota virus vaccine coverage. Our study findings recommends for the awareness building among the tea garden dwellers in regard to hand hygiene, timely initiation of complementary feeding, importance of vaccinating children with Rota virus vaccine as a part of containment programme.
ABSTRACT
Malnutrition in young children is often viewed as an outcome of the interactions of dietary consumption, socio-economic, and demographic factors. Social capital is a widely explored subject because of its implications on health and socio-economic factors, but has not gained recognition in its role as a determinant of nutritional status. Objectives: The study aimed to determine the association between maternal social capital and nutritional status of 6 to 24-month-old children living in urban and rural areas and to compare the effect of maternal social capital on the child’s nutritional status between an urban and a rural community setting. Methods: A total of 135 randomly selected mothers were interviewed in selected urban and rural communities in San Pablo City and Municipality of Rizal, Laguna, Philippines. Chi-square and Spearman’s test were used to determine the association of variables. Binary logistic regression was used to predict the effect of maternal social capital on nutritional status. Results: Levels of maternal social capital were the same in the urban and rural areas (p=0.24) and had a strong association with household food security ( p <0.05). In the urban area, maternal social capital was strongly associated with mother’s education ( p <0.01) and weight-for-age ( p <0.01) and height-for-age ( p <0.05). In the rural area, maternal social capital was strongly associated with mother’s education ( p <0.01), ethnicity ( p <0.01), marital status ( p <0.05) and weight-for-age ( p <0.01). Conclusion: There is an association between material social capital and nutritional status. Improvements in education and household food security as well as having parents living-in together may lead to better nutritional outcomes as these factors are associated with maternal social capital which in turn affects nutritional status of children aged 6 to 24 months.