Study of impact of sociocultural and economic factors of mothers on the nutritional status of their malnourished children in a rural area of Delhi, India

Abstract

Background: Even after following the multi-strategy approach of Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) in India for the last four decades, reducing malnutrition among children below 6 years has turned out to be a herculean task, because of the poor focus by Anganwadi workers (AWWs) on empowering community to manage malnutrition among the children at home level. Therefore, it becomes necessary to assess the role of the mothers in managing malnutrition in their children. Objectives: To study the impact of sociocultural and economic factors of mothers on the nutritional status of their malnourished children in a rural area of Delhi, India. Materials and Methods: The study was conducted for a 6-month duration (July-December 2013) in a rural ICDS block (Narela) of Delhi. The 80 mothers of both the healthy and malnourished children (40 mothers in each group) were interviewed in depth via semi-structured interview schedule; and all these mothers were separately studied further by focus group discussion technique to explore their beliefs, opinions, and practices on malnutrition management in their children. All the collected data were finally triangulated and analyzed after applying w 2-test from SPSS, version 22.0. Results: The main reasons behind inadequate efforts made by mothers in nutritional management of their children were the following: sporadic nutrition and health education given by AWWs at Anganwadi centers (AWCs) and homes to mothers leading to a lack of nutritional knowledge (p o 0.05) and inadequate treatment-seeking behavior toward malnourished children (47.5%) and the poverty causing mothers to work outside home (p o 0.05). Conclusion: AWWs need to focus urgently on their proper nutritional and health educational activities for mothers of malnourished children, regarding key messages on proper child-feeding practices and also the concerned government needs to provide more income opportunities to fathers of such children along with a targeted Public Distribution System.

Epidemiology of childhood diseases in an urban resettlement colony in Delhi

“…22 However, as per National Family Health Survey-3 (NFHS-3), there were 27% malnourished children in Delhi and the prevalence in this study was lower than state level figures. 23 Routine nutritional counselling to the mothers at the health centre could explain this lower prevalence in present study. Current study confirmed the fact that breastfeeding and colostrum is significantly associated with lower risk of ARI among children.…”

Local perspectives and context in relation to feeding practices of children under 2 years in the mountain villages of northern Thailand

“…In such contexts, interventions should be sensitive to collective responsibility for parenting ( 51 ) and care is needed so as not to break trusted ties within a community ( 52 ) . For example, Aubel et al ( 45 ) described providing nutrition education to grandmothers in Senegal and encouraging them to promote good nutritional practices related to pregnancy and infant feeding.…”

Impact of Nutritional Services of Anganwadi Workers in Improving Nutritional Status of Infants in Delhi: A Study by Mixed Method Technique

“…4 The role of father have 5 also been cited in the literature apart from other factors such sociocultural and economic factors of mothers and perceptions of community level stake holders and ICDS-health functionaries in nutritional status of under 5 years rural children of Delhi. [5][6][7] So, the real focus is poor on root of tackling undernourishment from birth till infancy, when the targets are most vulnerable.…”