Analysis of Some Nutrition Habits of Children with Moderate and Severe Intellectual Disability

Abstract

As a case study, the paper was planned and applied in order to identify nutrition characteristics of children with moderate and severe intellectual disability, some nutrition habits, and food consumption frequencies and treatments of families towards their nutrition. The sample of this research is included by 82 children and their parents at the age of 5-18 with moderate and severe intellectual disability who continue their education at Aksaray. Data of the research were collected between January-February 2018 from mothers by using questionnaires in face to face interview and some of the questionnaires were distributed and collected after making necessary explanations to some of them. Descriptive statistical analyzes such as percentage (%) and frequency (n) were made by SPSS package program. Chi-square (χ2) significance test was used for the statistical evaluation of the data collected of this search. In evaluating the food consumption frequency, a scoring system was used, using the formula T = 5T1 + 4T2 + 3T3 + 2T4 + 1T5. In order to compare foods with each other in terms of frequency of consumption, the percentage is calculated between the total score set for each food item and the highest total score that if this food consume every day. 73.2% of the participants were male and 26.8% were female. Age of the children ranged from 4 to 18, with an average of 10.71 ± 0.52 years. In the study, 46.3% of mothers stated that they can eat their own meal when they were asked "how does your child consume their meals?” 46.3% of them pointed that they sometimes eat with support of someone else, 7.4% stressed that they eat sometimes themselves and sometimes with the support of others. Mothers of 44 children who were unable to feed themselves stated that they can’t reach the independent nutrition stage. 39.1 % of them told that they polluted the environment, 37.0 % indicated that they cannot keep the spoon, and 23.9% complained that it took too much time for them.