School of Insurance and Economics, University of International Business and Economics (UIBE), Beijing, China.
Department of Anthropology, Quaid-I-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan.
Front Public Health. 2022 Feb 8;10:792164. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2022.792164. eCollection 2022.
Maternal nutritional awareness might reduce the risk of malnutrition in children. This study assesses the impact of mothers' nutritional and health awareness (MNHA) on the nutritional status of pre-school children in rural South Punjab. Using a proportionate purposive simple random sampling technique we collect data with the help of a self-administered questionnaire on height, age, the weight of children, and socio-economic profile from 384 rural households in one of the marginalized districts of Punjab. The study applied the binary logistic regression model to compute the probability of malnutrition. The results indicate that malnutrition was high in the district (the prevalence rate for underweight is 46.1%, for stunting 34.83%, and for wasting is 15.49%). Around 91.84% of malnourished children belonged to the low MNHA category compared to medium (5.61%) and high (2.55%) MNHA categories. The results further show that the prevalence of moderate and severe stunting, wasting, and underweight in low MNHA categories was much higher with large differences compared to both medium and high MNHA categories. The binary logistic regression results depict that, across the household deprivation index (HDS), the odds of a child becoming malnourished were lower in households HDS-2 category (OR = 0.02, 95% CI: 0.01-0.89), and odds were also lower in households HDS-3 category (OR = 0.001, 95% CI: 0.001-0.16). Similarly, across the scores of MNHA index, the odds of malnutrition were lower among the children of those mothers who had medium MNHA (OR = 0.04, 95% CI: 0.002-1.24), and also the probability of child malnutrition was lower among the children of mothers who had high MNHA (OR = 0.008, 95% CI: 0.002-0.29). The study urges that well-resourced, targeted, and coordinated health and nutritional education and awareness programs are required to tackle malnutrition.
母亲的营养意识可能会降低儿童营养不良的风险。本研究评估了母亲的营养和健康意识（MNHA）对旁遮普省农村学龄前儿童营养状况的影响。我们使用比例随机抽样技术，在旁遮普省一个边缘地区的 384 个农村家庭中，借助自我管理的问卷收集了关于身高、年龄、儿童体重和社会经济状况的数据。该研究应用二项逻辑回归模型计算了营养不良的概率。结果表明，该地区的营养不良情况较为严重（体重不足的患病率为 46.1%，发育迟缓为 34.83%，消瘦为 15.49%）。约 91.84%的营养不良儿童属于低 MNHA 类别，而中（5.61%）和高（2.55%）MNHA 类别的比例分别为 15.49%和 2.55%。结果还表明，低 MNHA 类别的中度和重度发育迟缓、消瘦和体重不足的患病率明显高于中、高 MNHA 类别的患病率，差异较大。二项逻辑回归结果表明，在家庭剥夺指数（HDS）方面，HDS-2 类家庭的儿童成为营养不良的几率较低（OR=0.02，95%CI：0.01-0.89），HDS-3 类家庭的几率也较低（OR=0.001，95%CI：0.001-0.16）。同样，在 MNHA 指数得分方面，中等 MNHA 母亲的孩子中，营养不良的几率较低（OR=0.04，95%CI：0.002-1.24），而高 MNHA 母亲的孩子中，儿童营养不良的概率也较低（OR=0.008，95%CI：0.002-0.29）。该研究敦促需要开展资源充足、有针对性和协调一致的健康和营养教育和宣传计划，以解决营养不良问题。
