Abstract:

Background: In Tanzania a high prevalence of acute and chronic under nutrition still persist, making it a country with one of the highest under nutrition burdens in Eastern and Southern Africa. Insufficient quantities and inadequate quality of complementary foods, poor feeding practices and high rates of infections have a detrimental effect on health and growth in children less than 2 years of age. Thus the aim of this study was to access the dietary diversity and feeding frequency among the 6-23 months children attending RCH clinic in Mwanza city.

Methodology: A descriptive cross sectional study was used to assess the dietary diversity and feeding frequency among 6-23 months children among 185 participants. Systematic sampling method was conducted and structured self-administered questionnaires were used to collect data. Data was entered to Microsoft excel and then exported to SPSS version 20.0 for further analysis.

A total of 185 participants were enrolled in this study. The prevalence of stunting was 17.7%, wasting 10.3%, underweight 5.9%. Among all children 57.0% were female and 42.5% male. The majority 62.9% of children did not reach the MDD and most of children 97.3% received MMF. The most commonly consumed types of foods were grains/cereals, roots and tubers 74.6% and legumes and nuts (beans, peas, lentils) 55.7%. Lesser proportions of children were reported to have consumed food items of the remaining foods including milk and dairy products (43.8%), flesh foods (meat, fish poultry and liver/organ meats) 34.6% as well as about 24.9% were consumed vitamin A containing fruits and vegetables. Consumption of diverse diet was significantly associated with reduction of stunting 26.5%, this study did not found association between wasting, underweight and dietary diversity of children.

Conclusion: Dietary diversity among 6-23 months children in Mwanza region Tanzania were very low, so mothers should be educated about how to prepare the diversified diet from locale available food groups for complementary feeding after 6 months.