Dietary Practices, Junk Food Consumption and Overweight among Adolescents in Schools of Urban Slums, Bengaluru

Dietary Practices, Junk Food Consumption and Overweight among Adolescents in Schools of Urban Slums, Bengaluru

Blog Article

Introduction: Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are among the rising trend and are often caused by modifiable risk factors.Ado- lescents are frequent victims due to junk food consumption and un- healthy diet leading to overweight and obesity.A nutritionally ad- equate and balanced diet is essential for optimal growth and devel- opment.Objectives: A cross-sectional study to assess the knowledge, atti- tude and dietary practices among the adolescents of urban slums.Also, to find the association of Body Mass Index (BMI) with fre- quency of junk foods consumption.

Materials and methods: 230 adolescents aged 13-15 years in Benga- luru Urban slums were assessed using multi-stage random sam- pling technique and data was collected.Bowl-method was em- ployed to quantify the measurements of foods consumed.Standard precautions were bar drain board taken to measure height and weight.Chi-square test was used to find association between BMI and frequency of junk food consumption.Results: Mean age of the students was 14.

02 (SD 0.96) and here majority were in 8th standard (42.2%).116 (50.4%) of them were boys.

Mean BMI of the adolescents was 20.7kg/m2 (SD 3.6) where, 68 (29.6%) of them were underweight, 62 (27%) were overweight and 4 (1.7%) were obese.

Only 39% had good knowledge, 71% had favourable attitude and good practice in 31% of adolescents.There was signif- icant association with frequency of junk food consumption and BMI variation.Conclusion: Adolescents had poor knowledge and practice.Over- weight was more prevalent among boys and Underweight in girls.There was significant association with frequency of junk food con- sumption and BMI variation.