Knowledge on vitamin A rich foods among mothers of preschool children in Nepal: Impacts on public health and policy concerns

"This study investigated the association of some socio-demographic, attitude, service availability and info-communication factors with the knowledge on vitamin A rich foods among mothers of preschool children in Nepal with its impacts on public health and policy concerns. The analyses demonstrated that about 71% of mothers were the Hindus ethnic group and 67% lived in nuclear family. A half of the child bearing aged mothers (51%) had higher secondary education with nearly 91% of the mothers were aware of vitamin A rich foods. A majority of mothers (53%) were in workforce and 65% of them had monthly family income above 10,000 Rupees with a good economic status. Almost 91% of the respondents' mothers grew vitamin A rich foods in their kitchen gardens and took it in their daily meal as diet. An estimate of 93% mothers attendeda health centre with their children during the vitamin A supplementation campaign. About79% mothers reported that they knew about the first visible symptoms of vitamin A deficiency disorder (VADD) and 95% mothers knew about the night blindness. The findings revealed that in Nepal knowledge on vitamin A rich foods among mother's of pre-school children is widely increasing, and in a particular community VADD has estimated as 9% while at the national level its real magnitude is still high at 24%. When the prevalence of VADD has been in a decreasing trend at local level communities then the overall rate also drops at the national level. Bivariate analysis showed that the three selected factors such as mother's education levels, mother's occupations, and monthly family income were significantly and positively associated with the mother's knowledge on vitamin A rich foods in diet, VADD curable and include green leafy vegetable and yellow fruits in diet.As these significant factors are directly influencing the level of awareness and practice of consuming vitamin A rich foods, efforts from the government and non-government organisations are needed to improve the overall conditions of mothers and allied public policy concerns in Nepal.