Prevalence and Risk Factors of under Nutrition among under Five Children in a Rural Community

Children of today are citizens of tomorrow; the young child under 5 years is most vulnerable to the vicious cycles of malnutrition, infection and disability all of which influence the present condition of a child and the future human resource development of the nation as a whole. Hence the assessment of the ground reality as reflected by the statistics on nutritional status of children becomes very significant in this context. The study was done to determine the prevalence of under-5 under nutrition and to identify the major child factors contributing to the development of under nutrition among the under 5 children. This was a cross sectional study conducted in the rural community of Nitte, a field practice area of Department of Community medicine, K S Hegde Medical Academy among all the children of the anganwadis under ICDS scheme. A total of 133 under 5 children were assessed for their nutritional status and the factors that affect nutritional status. The overall prevalence of under-5 under nutrition was found to be high at 63.16%. More girls were undernourished compared to boys, lower grades of undernourishment were more common and the prevalence of under nutrition increased with increasing age. There was a higher prevalence of underweight in children born with low birth weight, born premature, those children not exclusively breast fed and on improper complementary feeds. Immunization and Vitamin A supplementation of the under-5 children status was highly satisfactory.