Nutritional Status and Associated Factors among Basic School children in Sana'a City-Yemen

Abstract

Background: Malnutrition is an increasing health problem among children in developing countries. Few studies were conducted about school students' malnutrition in Yemen but this study focused on children in this age group in Sana'a city. Aim: To assess the nutritional status of basic school children in Sana'a city. .Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted from March 2017 to May2018. A multistage random sampling technique was applied to select 198 basic school students. .Data on demographic characteristics of students and their parents and anthropometric measurements of students were collected using structured questionnaire as face to face interview .Data was analysis using SPSS software program.. Statistical significance was considered when p-value <0.05. Results :The mean + SD of students' age were 10.96 + 2 .59 years with (50.5% to 49.5%) male to female percentage respectively. Out of 198 basic school children about 26.3% of them were underweight, 15.7% were healthy weight, 3.5% overweight and 2.5% obese based on CDC growth reference standard. The distribution of the children nutritional status based on their height for age showed that the majority of children were stunted 53.5%. There was strong statistically significant difference between children nutritional status and their sex, mother and father education, birth order. Conclusion: The most common form of malnutrition among basic school children in Sana'a city was underweight at the rate of (26.3%). Sex, mother and father education, birth order were key factors contributing to malnutrition in children. Nutrition education should be apply to community.