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Child development and Nutritional status of the children under five years of age in Manmunai West Divisional Secretariat areas of Batticaloa District, Sri Lanka

Author Affiliations

  • 1Department of Agricultural Chemistry, Faculty of Agriculture, Eastern University, Sri Lanka

Int. Res. J. Medical Sci., Volume 4, Issue (10), Pages 8-14, October,28 (2016)

Abstract

Nutrition related issues to the child are the most important concern in the world which ultimately influence on both child as well as the nation while considering them as the future generation to whole developmental attributes. Statistic shows that the birth rate and death rate of the child are higher in the developing countries while comparing with the developed countries where the nutritional status is in an advance. According to that, present study was carried out in the Manmunai West Divisional Secretariat in the Batticaloa District of Sri Lanka to determine the clinical issues and the nutritional status of the children. The study sample was consisting 283 families having the child below five years of age. A pre-tested questionnaire was used to collect the information related with the household data, clinical conditions of the child, and the nutritional status of the child during household visits. Finally, the data were analysed using SPSS (19 version) software. Results revealed that the average number of the family members in the household was three which was supported by the responding value of 30.4% and all the people were with the ethnicity of Tamil. As the village is now under the developing conditions, head of the household move to abroad and left their children with the father (2%), mother (24%) and relatives (4%) while the majority of the children were with both parents (70%). Further, the average birth weight of the child was within 2-3 kg (>45%) where the physical and mental disorders during the birth were rare. Around 98.6% of the respondents had regular visit to the MOH office and updated the nutritional status of their children and have the capability to explain the conditions of their child (91.9%). As the result of the health condition of the child, nearly 20% of the children were underweight which was under the improved condition (46.6%). Additionally the developmental status was began with the age of 0-6 months (97.5%), 11-12 months (45.9%), 11-14 months (55.8%) and 2-3 years (53.4%) for smiling, walking, speaking and eating independently, respectively. However, needs some attention on behalf of the growth rate of the children in Manmunai West Divisional Secretariat in the Batticaloa district.

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