Nutritional and exercise habits for prevention of osteoporosis among female adolescents in Assiut city secondary schools

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study is to identify the nutritional and exercise habits for prevention of osteoporosis among female adolescents in Assiut City secondary schools. The study was conducted in three female secondary schools in Assiut city. Secondary schools were stratified into general, nursing, and agricultural categories. A stratified random sampling was used to select one school from each stratum. Then, from each school, one class was randomly selected from each of the three academic years. Thus, a total of nine classes from three schools was recruited, and the total sample size was 412 girls. Identification and demographic data, dietary and exercise habits, attitude scale to measure attitudes towards dairy products and food frequency sheet were used to collect the data. The main result demonstrates that slightly more than half of the sample were eating two main meals per day [51.7%], and more than one third [35.4%] were eating only one meal per day. General and nursing secondary school girls had higher percentages of intake of balanced diet, compared to those in agricultural schools and the highest percentages of intake of balanced diet was among participants whose parents had university education. Two-fifth of the participants [42.2%] were practicing exercise, and only one-fifth [25.7%] did it regularly. The study findings lead to the conclusion that the adolescent secondary school students in Assiut city have deficient eating and exercise habits, particularly in relation to dairy products. This is influenced by type of school and parents' education. Therefore, it is recommended that making dairy products more attractive and available is recommended to encourage girls to consume more of these important food items