Nutrient adequacy and its correlation in a sub-Himalayan region of West Bengal, India

Introduction: Nutrientadequacy is the level of intake of an essential nutrientin relation to the nutrientrequirement for adequate health, which is expressed as the percentage of recommended dietary allowance. To develop an effective nationwide preventive program to combat malnutrition, it is necessary not only to assess the nature and magnitude of the problem of nutrientinadequacy but to identify factors affecting it especially at the household level. Objective: To estimate the prevalence of nutrientadequacy in a sample of households in a rural area of Darjeeling district and to find out the factors associated with nutrientadequacy. Materials and Methods: A community-based cross-sectional study was carried out from January 2014 to December 2014 in 821 households of Darjeeling district, India. The major dependent variable used in this study was the mean nutrientadequacy ratio of a household and the independent variables were number of family members, number of under-fivechildren in the family, literacyof head of the family, literacyof the wife of the head of the family, incomeof the family, and percentage expenditure on food. Results: The prevalence of nutrientadequate households was found to be 35.3% among the study households. It was observed that the percentage expenditure on food had the highest contribution toward nutrientadequacy, followed by number of under-fivechildren in the family and literacy of the wife of the head of the family. Undernutrition was found to be prevalent in 56.6% of the households. Conclusion: Majority of the study population had a diet less than the required amount and expectedly, undernutrition was also present in huge proportions.