An Investigation on Adherence to the Daily Dietary Intake Recommendations among Pregnant Women in Jigawa North-West Zone, Nigeria

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Introduction: Past investigations revealed that there were no specific recorded data available on the adherence to the daily recommended dietary intakes among pregnant women in Jigawa North-West zone in Nigeria. Purpose: This study investigates the adherence of a cohort of pregnant women to the daily dietary intake recommendations in Jigawa north west zone, Nigeria. Methodology: The study cohort was population based of enrolled pregnant women who routinely attended the antenatal care of the General Hospital Kazaure (GHK), Jigawa state, Nigeria. A total of 207 pregnant women were enrolled for the study, where a descriptive study was conducted using Semi-Quantitative Food Frequency Questionnaire (SQFFQ) administered in a face to face interviewed-administrated procedure. Data Analysis: Data obtained were presented using descriptive statistics, relative frequencies and charts. The analysis was done using the SPSS statistical software package and the level of significance was set at p<0.05. The data analyzed were presented as frequency tables. Pearson chi‑square (X^2) and t‑tests were used to test for associations between categorical and continuous variables, respectively. Results and Conclusion: The results revealed that most of the pregnant women in the zone do not adhere to nutritional guidelines in their pregnancy, none of the enrolled women met the recommendations for all the FiveFood Groups (FFG). Adherence on some of FFG varies more with their socioeconomic characteristics than their locations