Survey result on dietary recall of school children / Монголын Анагаах Ухаан

ABSTRACT

BackgroundAn estimated 522 066 students are studying in secondary school of Mongolia and it was 19% of total population. Population life expectancy and health status is directly related to adolescents’ health, as many chronic disease conditions are affiliated with adolescence. Many premature deaths among adults result from behavior initiated during adolescence. According to the NRC survey, one in thirteen schoolchildren (7.3%) was underweight, 16.3% was stunting, and 13.8% were iodine deficiency. It has taken 52.8% of total daily energy among 11-14 years schoolchildren and 50.5% were between 15 and 17 ages. In addition, research in Mongolia in 2005 indicate serious problems in healthy eating behavior; 8% of adolescents consumed milk products on daily basis, 71.7% had breakfast only sometimes, and 83.2% had a meal one time per day. Micronutrient deficiency such as anemia, A, D vitamins among them is cause of low consumption of vegetable and fruits. There is a need to study schoolchildren’s dietary recall.ObjectiveTo study and evaluate schoolchildren’s nutritional statusMaterials and MethodsThe descriptive and cross sectional study was carried out in 4 districts of Ulaanbaatar city (750 schoolchildren from each district) and 2 aimags (889 schoolchildren from Uvurkhangai and 925 from Dornod) of Mongolia. Also determined current nutrition situation of surveyed schoolchildren by using 24 hours recall method and assessed.ResultA total of 4760 (46.6% boys and 53.4% girls) school children surveyed and 46.6% were boys and 53.4% were girls. 71.7 percent of total respondents have breakfast sometimes, 83.2 of them have a lunch only one time per day, and 38.3 percent of total daily energy takes from dinner and have not any difference between age groups. Adolescent aged 7-10 years takes 92.7 percent of total calorie, 90.1 percent of protein, 93.9 percent of carbohydrate and 92.3 percent of fat compared to RDI of Mongolia and thus animale fat is the 1.6 times more than the norm. Consumption of vitamins and minerials such as vitamin A, and iron8 calcium were insufficient among schoolchildren. Specially, it was lower among male student than female. For instance vitamin C intake was 48.0- 58.6 percent among female students aged above 11 years and it was 47.3- 51.8 percent for male students. About 30 percent of total calcium is consumed per day among overal respondents. Conclusions:1. Daily intake of basic nutrients and energy is lower by 10-30 percent than RDI of Mongolia among schoolchildren.2. High consumption of in diet among male adolescents of age 15 years and above causes disbalance of adequate ratio of main nutrients as protein8 fat and carbohydrates.3. There is not enough suffecient consumption of vitamins and minerials specially calcium.