IMPACT OF DIETARY COUNSELLING ON NUTRITIONAL STATUS OF ELDERLY IN BIHAR
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Date
2022
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Publisher
Dr.RPCAU, Pusa
Abstract
Aging is the process of growing old chronologically. The term aging is often
applied to the people of middle age (40 to 60 years) and old age (above the age of 60
years). The health of the people is an important issue defining the health status of a
population. Malnutrition in elderly people is very common because daily food
consumption decreases with old age.Aging and nutrition has explicit intrinsic
relationship. Old age has direct effect on required amounts of nutrients, their
absorption and subsequent metabolism. Other factors like feeding difficulty,
psychological distress, reduced mobility, being widowed, illiteracy, poverty and poor
access to health and social services may also affect the nutritional status of elderly
people. Thus, the majority of the health problems are nutrition related and nutrition
dependent. Therefore, it is very essential to assess the nutritional status of the elderly
people to initiate appropriate nutrition interventions/counselling to prevent or delay
the adverse health effects of malnutrition among elderly people. The present study
was carried out with the objective to assess the nutritional status and food
consumption pattern of the elderly, to impart nutrition education and dietary
counseling to the elderly and to study the impact of nutrition education and dietary
counselling on the elderly. For this purpose a total of fifty elderly people were
randomly selected from Teera village of Jathmalpur panchayat in Kalyanpur block of
Samastipur district, Bihar. To fulfill the objective of the study, a well structured
questionnaire was developed to extract relevant information from the elderly. After
collection and compilation of all the data nutrition education and dietary counselling
was given to the elderly people. The selected elderly subjects were given the same
interview schedule again after the counselling to know the impact of nutrition
education and dietary counselling on nutritional knowledge and also on daily dietary
intake of the elderly. The findings of the investigation revealed that out of fifty
elderly, 80.0 per cent were females and 20.0 per cent were males. The highest percent
of elderly (90.0%) were illiterate and only 10.0 per cent elderly were literate. It was
also found that majority of the elderly (58.0%) had low family monthly income i.e.
between Rs/10,000-20,000. More females (80.0%) were underweight with mild
thinness (67.5%) as comparison to male respondent (60.0%). All the elderly (100.0%)
were found vegetarian and majority (44.0%) of the elderly was taking their meal two
times in a day. It was also discovered that the elderly's intake of all food items was
lower than the Recommended Dietary Intake. In addition, nutrient intake was also
lower than Recommended Dietary Allowances. The findings of present study also
revealed that females were consuming less amount of food than the males. It was
observed that majority of the elderly (94.4%) had poor nutritional knowledge before
imparting nutrition education and dietary counselling, while after counselling only
15.6 per cent of elderly had poor nutritional knowledge. The dietary intake of various
food groups significantly (p< 0.05) increased and counselling had a positive impact
on the nutrient intake of elderly people. The percentage increase in the RDA adequacy
of protein, dietary fiber, calcium, iron and β carotene was observed i.e. 10.75 per cent,
16.44 per cent, 5.29 per cent, 8.58 per cent and 13.2 per cent respectively in female
elderly. On the other hand in male elderly the percentage increase in the RDA
adequacy was reported for protein (6.97%), dietary fiber (9.15%), calcium (5.5%),
iron (4.37%) and β carotene (6.72%). The study's findings concluded that lack of
nutritional knowledge combined with a low economic status has a negative impact on
the nutritional status of the elderly. Proper nutritional knowledge can influence daily
dietary intake and also change perceptions toward wrong food consumption practices.
This can definitely improve the nutritional status of the elderly.