NUTRITIONAL STATUS AND ITS ASSOSCIATED FACTORS AMONG ADULT POPULATION RESIDING IN DHARAN SUBMETROPOLITAN CITY

Abstract

The rapid social and economic transition of Nepal has resulted in the issue of double burden of malnutrition. Individual with lower weight are at risk various disease and disorder but the individuals with excess weight are also at the risk for a variety of disabling and life-threatening chronic conditions, including high blood pressure, menstrual abnormalities, psychosocial dysfunction etc. Thus, a cross-sectional descriptive study was done on 159 adults aged 18-59 years using a structured questionnaire and weight, height, waist circumference and hip circumference were measured to calculate BMI and analyzed using WHO classification. This study determined the pattern and prevalence of underweight, overweight and obesity along with central obesity among the people of Dharan. Microsoft excels and SPSS version 20 was used to analyze data. Chi square test was used to analyze the association between BMI and all the potential risk factors. It was found that 5.4% were underweight, 44.7% were normal weight, 33.3% were overweight and 16.4% were obese. This study also found that blood pressure (p= 0.048), age (p=0.03), diabetes (p=0.05), type of diet (p=0.05) were significantly associated with the nutritional status of people residing in Dharan sub-metropolitan city. Type of diet (p=0.05), occupation(p=0.05) and blood pressure(p=0.04) were found to have a relation with abdominal obesity due to waist circumference while consumption of junk food(p=0.05) was found to be associated with abdominal obesity (WHR).To address both underweight and overweight, policymakers must simultaneously focus on encouraging positive behavior through education and addressing society-level risk factors that prevent people from achieving optimal health.