Nutritional Status of Upper Level Students in Chiang Mai Municipality Primary Schools

Abstract

Background: Nutritional status is an indicator of a child’s health and is important for their development. 
Objective: To explore the nutritional status, knowledge, food consumption behavior and the factors related to the nutritional status of upper level students in Chiang Mai Municipality primary schools,
Material and method: A survey study was undertaken in semester 2/2015 among 508 upper level students from 5 primary schools of Chiang Mai Municipality. All participants were selected by a multi-stage random sampling method. Weight and height were measured and interpreted according to the weight-for-height standards of Thai children to approximate the level of nutritional status. The relation between nutritional status and general data, nutritional status and knowledge level were analyzed by Chi-square test.
Results: The mean age was 11.2 ± 1.0 years (range 9-15) and 51% of participants were male. Most of their parents were employees (47.7%) and 51.4% received the daily pocket money of 41-60 Baht. Most of them had an average-built nutritional status (70.3%), followed by obese (10.8%), rather obese (7.9%), plump (4.9%), rather thin (4.7%) and thin (2.0%). Two-thirds (64.8%) had the moderate level of nutritional knowledge. The nutritional status was significantly related with male gender (p=0.011) and amount of daily pocket money (p=0.005), but not related with the level of nutritional knowledge (p=0.364).
Conclusion: Male gender and the amount of daily pocket money were significantly related to the students’ nutritional status.