Chaudhary, GitanjaliKORANGA, AYUSHI2023-10-262023-10-262022M/FN/018/2020-21https://krishikosh.egranth.ac.in/handle/1/5810199735Aging 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.EnglishThesis