NUTRITIONAL ASSESSMENT AND ITS ASSOCIATED FACTORS AMONG 6-59 MONTHS CHILDREN IN DALIT COMMUNITY OF BAGCHAUR MUNICIPALITY, SALYAN

Abstract

The study was conducted to assess the nutritional status of 6-59 months children of Bagchaur, municipality and to find out the factors associated with it. A community based cross sectional descriptive study was conducted on children aged 6-59 months for assessing the nutritional status and factors associated with it in Bagchaur municipality. A sample of 205 children were selected from the 4 wards of a municipality and 4 wards were selected using simple random sampling. Anthropometric measurements were then used to determine if children were underweight (weight-for-age), wasting (weight-for-height) and stunting (height-for-age) based on WHO reference. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) 20.0 version and World Health Organization (WHO) Anthro 3.2.2 version were used for analyzing the data. Chi-square test was used to identify the associated factors of malnutrition. This study revealed that, 51.2%, 20.5% and 7.3% of children were stunted, underweight and wasted, respectively. The main associated factors of wasting were found to be caste (p=0.017) and immunization (p=0.013). Underweight was found associated with family occupation (p=0.049) and religion (p=0.029) was found associated with stunting. From the findings of this study, it is concluded that malnutrition is still an important problem among children aged 6-59 months. Therefore, special attention should be given on intervention of malnutrition.