Panacea Journal of Medical Sciences

Childhood obesity: Not so common for adolescents in an urban slum

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Article Type : Original Article

Author Details: Mohan Joshi, Pranita Dharmadhikari

Volume : 7

Issue : 2

Online ISSN : 2348-7682

Print ISSN : 2249-8176

Article First Page : 95

Article End Page : 98

Abstract

Childhood obesity is emerging as a major health problem among early adolescent school children. The present study is a cross sectional, questionnaire based study carried out among 220 early adolescent school children in an urban slum of metropolitan city using WHO (2007) recommended cut-off points. Among the total study population, 58% were boys and 42% were girls. As per age wise distribution, 35% were from 10-11, 31% from 11-12 and 34% from 12-13 years of age group. The overall prevalence rates of underweight, normal, overweight were 75.6%, 19%, 5.45% respectively. Though none of the study subjects were frankly obese, the prevalence of overweight/obese was 5.45%. It was noted that the majority of study subjects 166(75%) were either thin or severe thin. In the context of present study, the high prevalence of under nutrition may be due to their low calorie intake and lack of awareness on proper eating habits. Present study highlighted the existence of childhood under nutrition as a threat, which is likely to persist to adult life among these school children. Hence it is recommended that the teachers and the parents should be sensitized for the maintenance of healthy eating habits among the adolescent age group.

Keywords: Obesity, Overweight, Early adolescent, Urban slum.

Doi No:-10.18231