Demographic and Health Profile of Tribal Population at Udaipur, Rajasthan: A Cross Sectional Study

Abstract

Background: India is the second largest home for tribal communities, and they are distributed all over the country.One of the main public health concerns in our nation, which has a vast forest belt and numerous tribes living there, is tribal health and the problems encountered by tribal people.Objective: 1. To determine the Socio - Demographic profile of the tribal population.2. To estimate the health problems of the tribal population.Materials and Methods: The present study was a community based, cross-sectional, multicentric study carried out among tribal populations residing in Iswal, Gogunda, and Losing village from 1st November 2022 to 1st January 2023. House-to-house visits were done to collect socio-demographic data and health check-ups of all family were done to identify the health problems among them.Results: A total of 906 tribal people (160 families) were interviewed. Age ranged between 1 month to 95 years with a mean age of 30.05 ± 19.22 years, the majority were in the age group of 11-30 years. About 51.32% were males and 48.68% were females, and literacy rates were low. About 60.63% of family’s socioeconomic status was class IV and V, Hindu religion (82.45%) was most followed among them, and nuclear family types (45.63%) were more common. Overall housing conditions were good. Most of them had pucca houses (64.3%), consumed purified drinking water (73.1%), had separate kitchens (78.7%), used LPG as the major fuel for cooking (63.1%). While some practiced open-air defecation, and most of them dumped the house-generated waste (garbage) indiscriminately or on the streets 54.3). out of 906 individuals 714 individuals were apparently healthy whereas 192 individuals had certain health problems. Among them respiratory illness was the major problem affecting 52 (28.08 %) individuals followed by sexually transmitted infections 46 (19.86 %). Whereas injuries by wild animals / RTA were the least common health problem encountered among tribals 2(1.04%).