Abstract

Introduction: India’s population has reached the 1 billion mark, out of which 21% are adolescents⁽¹⁾. India has the largest population of adolescents (243 million)⁽²⁾The nutritional and the health needs of the adolescents are also more because of the growth spurt and the increase in physical activity in them.⁽³⁾ In a family with limited resource the female child is more likely to be neglected. She is deprived of good food and education and is utilized as an extra working hand to carry out the household works. The added burden of menstrual blood loss, normal or abnormal precipitates the anaemia too often.

Methods: This was a community-based Cross-Sectional descriptive Study conducted in the schools of rural area surrounding Bhubaneswar, Odisha between from November 2016 to October 2018 over a period of two years.

Results: The prevalence of anemia was found to be a whopping 61.6% most profound (71.4% of the girls) in the age group of 13-16 yrs. Age was significantly associated with anaemia. Occupation, religion, marital status, diet pattern and BMI did not show any significance with anaemia. Father’s education, occupation, mother’s occupation, type of family and birth order revealed no significance with anaemia.

Conclusion: Burden of anemia continues to be a problem in the school going population of girls despite the various prophylactic programmes being conducted.

Keywords: Anemia, Prevalence, Burden, Awareness, Education.