Mandira Shahi, Laxmi Rai, Raj Devi Adhikari and Muna Sharma
Tribhuvan University, Nepal
Scientific Tracks Abstracts: J Diabetes Metab
More than 1.4 billion adults, 20 years and older, were overweight, of these overweight adults, over 200 million men and nearly 300 million women were obese. The objective of the study was to explore the prevalence and factors associated with obesity among adult women of Ramkot VDC (Village Development Committee), Kathmandu district of Nepal. A crosssectional descriptive study was used to explore the prevalence and factors associated with obesity among adult women of the age group between 20 to 59 years. Five wards were selected randomly on the lottery is drawn and quota sampling basis. 22 samples were drawn from each selected wards and there were 110 sample sizes. A questionnaire guided interview method was incorporated BMI was calculated by following the formula: weight in kg/height in m2. The prevalence of obesity and overweight is 24.5% and 1.8% respectively. There is no association of BMI with caste, education, and age. 81.7% of respondents, who consumed fruits more than five times a week had low BMI, whereas 44% of respondents, who consumed fruits less than once a week, had high BMI indicating overweight and obesity. The significant difference between consuming fruits daily or not was shown by the chi-square (p-value) i.e. 0.013. The finding of this study shows that the prevalence of overweight and obesity among women was 24.5% and 1.8% respectively. Overweight and obesity of women was not associated with physical activities, vegetarian or non-vegetarian diet nor the frequency of food they usually took. But the women who consumed fruits frequently in their diet had a low body mass index than women who consumed fruits less frequently. To conclude, overweight and obesity among adult women in Nepal were associated with scarce fruit intake.
Mandira Shahi is currently working as a Professor in the National Center for Health Professions Education (NCHPE) Tribhuvan University, Institute of Medicine. She has done her Master of Health Professions Education (MHPE) from the University of Maastricht, The Netherlands in 2001. She also did her M. Phil in Education from 'The Global Open University Nagaland', India in 2010. Now she is a PhD Scholar in Singhania University, Rajasthan, India and also holds the title of PhD in Distance Education in Nepal: Its Application. She became the Coordinator of the Clinical Elective Programme for Foreign Medical/Nursing Students and Coordinator for Faculty Development Training as well as facilitator/resource person to develop and revise curriculum of various levels in health professions education. Similarly, she has had experience in various educational health-related research and module development as well as dedicated herself to teaching medical education for numerous levels in the health profession from Bachelors to Masters level.
E-mail: mandiranp@yahoo.com
