PS-P09-7: ASSESSMENT OF DIETARY DIVERSITY AMONG ADULT HYPERTENSIVES

Abstract

Introduction: In contrast to developed countries, dietary quality is a growing challenge in developing countries. Several techniques of measuring food consumption using basic tools such as the 24-hour diet recall have been presented in recent years. This individual dietary diversity score (IDDS) proposed by FAO is a basic measure for evaluating diet quality, defined as the number of food groups represented in the diet across time. Objective: The goal of this study was to determine the individual dietary variety score of hypertensives who visited the hospital's out-patient department. Materials and Techniques: Data on the dietary intake of 200 hypertension patients was collected using an interviewer-administered questionnaire. In addition, anthropometric measurements were taken. The 14 food groups specified by the FAO were used to create IDDS classification tertiles. Results: Individual IDDS averaged 6 ± 1.83 food groups in the past 24hrs by hypertension patients. In our study, 8% of hypertension individuals had a high IDDS. Cereals, white tubers, other vegetables, legumes, oils and fats, and oils and fats were the most commonly consumed dietary groups by our people, at the expense of leafy vegetables, vitamin A fruits, other fruits and fish, nuts and seeds. In terms of anthropometric variables, waist circumference had a significant (p0.05) influence on food diversification in hypertensives, although BMI had no effect. Conclusion: When analysed on an individual DDS, the majority of patients do not meet the average based on 14 food groups. As a result, the average number of food categories ingested by the participants over the reference period is deemed inadequate. In contrast to cereals, oils, and fats, fruits and vegetables were the least consumed food groups. Given the importance of dietary diversity to nutrition and health, these findings suggest that efforts should be mobilised to ensure that people have better access to nutrition information. Despite the fact that this study needs to be expanded up to a multi-centric study and comparisons with other nations are needed to harmonise the technique, our findings demonstrate that using a basic tool can be beneficial when used at a community level. IDDS can be proposed as a ready to use tools across all healthcare sectors to promote dietary diversity.