Nutritional status of children attending OPD at tertiary care hospital in Katihar, Bihar.

Background: Despite India’s remarkable economic growth over the last decade, many children still struggle to meet their basic needs, include access to sufficient food and health care .In this context it was important to get a more recent data on child nutritional status. Aims & Objective: (1) Prevalence of malnutrition in children under 5 years of age coming to Pediatric OPD at Katihar medical college; (2) Age and sex most severely affected by malnutrition; (3) Identify major risk factors associated with malnutrition in the population under study. Material and Methods: Institution based cross-sectional study was carried out in Pediatric OPD of Katihar medical college The median weight for height, height for age and weight for height of NCHS standard were used as references anthropometric indices. A total of 260 randomly selected children were covered in the study of 20 days. Results: Prevalence of underweight (30%), stunted (74.2%) and wasting (41.9%). The major risk factors affecting nutritional status include mother’s age, mothers and fathers education, monthly per capita income, pre lacteal feeds, birth order and duration of breast feeding. The study demonstrates multiple risk factors affecting nutrition status. Conclusion: The study demonstrates multiple risk factors affecting nutrition status. A more elaborate community based study would help to find out prevalence of malnutrition in children of Katihar and it should be done at regular interval in order to monitor the situation.