Department of Human Nutrition and Consumer Sciences

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Browsing Department of Human Nutrition and Consumer Sciences by Subject "Adolescent"

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    Nutritional status and socio-economic problems of adolescent pregnant girls: A case study of Morogoro, Coast and Dar es salaam regions
    (Sokoine University of Agriculture, 2002) Shirima, Candida Philip
    Adolescence is a distinct and dynamic phase of development and considered to be the period between 10 and 19 years of age. It marks the onset of puberty. In some communities, it means the girl child is ready to engage in marital affairs and bear children. This dissertation presents the results of a study conducted in Temeke, Kibaha and Morogoro districts to examine the socio-economic factors and nutritional problems of adolescent pregnant girls. Specifically, the study examined prevalence of adolescent pregnancies, factors contributing to early pregnancies, problems faced by pregnant adolescent girls, pre-pregnancy nutritional status, nutritional status during pregnancy and pregnancy outcome. Primary data were collected from 180 pregnant adolescent girls and 600 non-pregnant adolescent girls. Nutritional status was assessed by anthropometric and biochemical methods. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) was employed to analyse the data. Prevalence of adolescent pregnancy was found to be 21.5% for Temeke district, 19.5% in Kibaha district and 17.7% in Morogoro district. Factors identified to contribute to early pregnancy are: traditions and culture of initiation rites, lack of knowledge on family planning, fear of side effects associated with family planning methods and economic hardship among adolescent girls. It was further observed that adolescent girls encounter many problems such as unplanned pregnancies and marriages, dropout from school, late detection of pregnancy, late antenatal visit to detect any abnormalities, rejection by their partners after conception, and economic dependence.