Vandana Goyal¹* and Nimali Singh²

¹Research Scholar, Department of Home Science, University of Rajasthan, India
²Associate Professor, Department of Home Science, University of Rajasthan, India

*Corresponding Author: Vandana Goyal, Research Scholar, Department of Home Science, University of Rajasthan, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India.

Received: June 11, 2021; Published: July 06, 2021

Abstract

Introduction: Poor feeding practices directly or indirectly contribute to undernutrition, morbidity, and mortality in children. The reasons are not just the socioeconomic background but also the lack of knowledge and awareness about proper feeding practices. The present study was carried out in Jaipur City with the objective that improving knowledge would lead to improvement in diet diversity practices.

Methodology: The study was conducted on 107 mothers of children aged 12 - 24 months attending the vaccination clinic of JK Lon Hospital in Jaipur city. All the selected mothers were approached personally and WHO, 2010 scale was used to study their diet diversity practices at pre and post-stage. A child receiving four or more on this scale is considered to have adequate diet diversity. A structured intervention protocol was developed and used for intervention.

Results: In the pre-stage of the study the scores for dietary diversity were calculated to be 3.16 ± 0.98, 3.75 ± 1.52 and 4.42 ± 0.67 among boys of low, mid and high SES respectively, which increased to 3.38 ± 0.91, 4.17 ± 1.01 and 4.76 ± 0.62 out of 7 at post counseling. For girls the score increased from 3.11 ± 1.16 to 3.23 ± 1.25 in low SES, 3.55 ± 1.42 to 3.66 ± 1.22 in mid SES and 4.36 ± 1.03 to 4.76 ± 0.87 in high SES respectively. Irrespective of the increase in knowledge, the impact of the intervention was found to be statistically insignificant in all the three subgroups of girls from pre to post-stage. The difference in the mean score of boys and girls for both pre-stage and post-stage across SES was statistically significant using ANOVA at p < 0.01.

Conclusion: In India, feeding practices appear to be influenced by social, cultural, and economic factors. It is recommended to provide education to mothers and to strengthen the public health education campaigns so as to improve the positive practices which can, in turn, improve the health and well-being of the children.

Keywords:Diet Diversity; Feeding; WHO

References

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Citation

Citation: Goyal and Nimali Singh. “Impact of Nutrition Counseling on Diet Diversity Practices of Children (12 - 24 months) in Jaipur City".Acta Scientific Nutritional Health 5.8 (2021): 10-14.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2021 Goyal and Nimali Singh. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.