iron deficiency anemia and its association with overweight and obesity among adolescents in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
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Date
2018-10
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Addis Ababa Universty
Abstract
Background: Iron Deficiency Anemia (IDA) is a global public health problem among school age children and adolescents, which retards psychomotor development and impairs cognitive performance. However there is limited data on the prevalence of IDA and its association with overweight and obesity among adolescents in Ethiopian context.
Objective: To determine the magnitude of iron deficiency anemia and examine its association with overweight and obesity among adolescents in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Method: A School based, cross-sectional study was conducted among 363 high school adolescents of Addis Ababa from March to April 2018. A multi-stage random sampling procedure was followed and participants were interviewed using structured questionnaire. Socio-demographic, economic and dietary data including 4 ml of venous blood sample was collected. The blood was used for serum iron, CRP & complete blood count analysis. Anthropometric data was also measured and entered in to WHO Anthro plus software to compute the nutritional indices. Data were analyzed using SPSS Version 20 software. For all statistical tests, significance level was set at p-value of <0.05.
Result: The overall prevalence of anemia, iron deficiency and IDA were 12.9% (95% CI: 9.6%-16.5%), 16.3% (95% CI: 12.4%-20.1%) and 7.4% (95% CI: 4.7%-9.9%) respectively. The majority 37 (78.7%) of anemic adolescents had mild anemia followed by moderate 9 (19.1%) and one severe anemia (2.1%). From the overall anemic adolescents 27 (57.3%) had iron deficiency (serum iron level of < 60μg/dl). Being overweight and obese showed an increased risk of IDA in which 15.4% of overweight or obese adolescents had IDA when compared with adolescents of normal weight (AOR = 4.2; 95% CI =1.21-17.29).
Conclusion and recommendation: IDA is a mild public health problem among school adolescents of Addis Ababa which had significant association with overweight and obesity. Therefore it is essential to launch school based interventions that targets excess body weight and poor iron status.
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Keywords
Anemia,obesity