Noshaba Shafqat, Saima Manzoor, Shafquat Abbasi.
Relationship of sociodemographic factors with malnutrition in preschool children: a community based study.
Pak J Med Res Jan ;52(4):120-5.

Objectives: To assess the nutritional status and potential risk factors for malnutrition in children less than 5 years of age in a community. Settings and duration: Basic Health Unit at Nawanshehr, Abbottabad from December 2008 to June 2009. Subjects and Methods: A community based cross sectional study was done over 06 months. Random cluster sampling was done and sample size of 393 houses was calculated with an error of 10%. The parameters studied in children were age, weight, nutritional status and weaning practices while for mothers the parameters included their literacy and knowledge about their health. WHO’s criteria of malnutrition – NCHS was used. Data were entered in SPSS 15.0 and analyzed. Results: A total of 393 children and their mothers were included in the study. In children; nutritionally, 245(62.3%) were normal, 148 malnourished, 77(19.6%) undernourished and 71(18.19%) over nourished. When data of normal children was compared with malnourished and it was found that literacy of mother, her knowledge about health including hand washing and maintaining contact with lady health worker, boiling water and giving ORS and practice of not throwing garbage at open spaces were significant predictors of better child nutritional status. Conclusion: Child’s nutritional status is strongly associated with the literacy of mothers, their health awareness and child rearing practices.

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