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Background: As a result of dietary habits and patterns in pregnancy, dietary inadequacies are
higher during pregnancy than at any other stage of the life cycle. Restriction of food intake
and inappropriate nutritional practices in combination with environmental, socioeconomic
factor and infections is common causes of maternal mortality, low birth weight, and
intergrowth retardation. Despite the wider scope of the problem, no research data has been
explored about maternal nutritional practice in this study area.
Objective: The aim of this study was to assess nutritional practice of pregnant mothers and
associated factors among antenatal care attendants in Malga Woreda, Sidama Zone, South
Ethiopia.
Method: A facility based quantitative cross-sectional study was conducted from march 1to
April 2, 2019 among sampled 392 pregnant women who came for focused antenatal care
follow-up in the selected health institutions by using multistage stratified sampling. Data was
collected by trained data collectors using structured questionnaire. The data was coded,
cleaned, entered using Epi info version 3.7 and analyzed using SPSS version 22 statistical
software. A descriptive statics for different variables was done and summarized as numbers
and percentages. Bi-variable and multi variable logistic regressions were performed to
identify factors associated with nutritional practice of pregnant mothers. The strength of
statistical association was measured by adjusted odds ratios (AOR) and 95% confidence
intervals. In all cases P-value, less than 0.05 was considered as statistically significant.
Results: Among the interviewed 392 mothers only 34.7% (95%CI: 30.1%,39.3%) of them
have good practice on maternal nutrition during their pregnancy. About 54.8 % of the
participants avoid certain food items during their pregnancy. Mother’s educational status
(AOR=3.43,95%CI: 1.173,10.027), family size (AOR=0.116, 95%CI :0.037,0.36), household
monthly income(AOR=2.875,95%CI:1.077,7.676), husband’s educational status (AOR=5.97,
95%CI :1.551,23.033) and having nutrition information (AOR=3.096, 95%CI :1.213,7.902)
were factors significantly associated with nutritional practice of pregnant mothers.
Conclusions: Nutritional practice of pregnant mothers were relatively low in this study. The
concerned bodies should strengthen nutrition education on importance of maternal nutrition
and create strategies to increase nutritional practice of pregnant mothers. |
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