European Journal of Molecular & Clinical Medicine

Abstract

Background: Anemia is the world’s second leading cause of disability and thus one of
the most serious global public health problems. Adolescents of both sexes are
particularly vulnerable for developing anemia because of rapid growth and girls
additionally because of the onset of menstruation. The aim of this study to assess the
clinic-hematological profile of nutrition anemia among adolescents at a tertiary care
centre.
Materials& Methods: This is a hospital based observational study done on 50
adolescents attending OPD at JNUIMSRC, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India during one year
study period will be participating in this study as per the inclusion and exclusion
criteria. Anemia will be diagnosed according to the World Health Organisation (WHO)
criteria. Student t test (two tailed, independent) has been used to find the significance of
study parameters on continuous scale between two groups (Inter group analysis) on
metric parameters by using SPSS version 22.0 software.
Results: In 50 anemic adolescents studied, 34 were females, 16 were males. 50%
belongedto middle adolescence. 30% of study population belonged to lower middle
socioeconomicstatus according to modified Kuppuswamy’s classification. Anemia was
high amongvegetarian adolescent girls (55.88%). The commonest clinical presentation
was fatiguewhich was 56%. 42% adolescents had severe thinness according to WHO
classificationof body mass index (BMI). 48% had food skipping, 20.58% of adolescent
girls hadmenstrual irregularities. There was no significant difference among the
adolescent males and females pertaining to clinical eatures and laboratory values.
Conclusion: Nutritional anemia is a burden on adolescent children, as it affects the
transition of childhood to adulthood, and it influences the future health. B12 deficiency is
highly prevalent among the vegetarians. Nutritional awareness education should be
given to adolescents as they fear of gaining weight, irregular food habits, food faddism,
decreased intake of green leafy vegetables/animal proteins.