Malnutrition Among Basic Schools' Children of Elshagalwa Village, Shendi Locality, Sudan

摘要

In this cross-sectional community based study, first class children of six basic school children (three male schools and three female schools) of Elshagalwa village, north of Shendi town were subjected to determine their nutritional status by assessing total serum protein and serum albumin. The method s of our study included a questionnaire in order to determine the nutrition status of child; usually consumed foodstuff and socioeconomic status of child‘s family, and biochemical parameters such as total serum protein and serum albumin. The study showed that the mean ± SD of total serum protein and serum albumin of study sample were 6.4 ± 0.9 g/dl and 4.0 ± 0.6 g/dl respectively. The present study also revealed that most of pupils had normal nutrition status (87.2%) and 12.8% of children were suffering from malnutrition, 5.6% of them were with moderate malnutrition, 94.4% with mild malnutrition and there are no cases with severe malnutrition. The study suggested that the child sex (gender) showed no effect on children nutritional status, parents' education level particularly of mothers had a positive effect on nutritional status and family size had a negative effect on nutritional status.