Poor food and frequent infection lead to malnutrition and hold back the physical and mental development of a child. Parents can prevent such condition of a child even in low income communities - if they know about the special needs of the child and are supported by their communities and the government in putting that knowledge into practice.
Children from birth to the age of three years should be weighed every month. Regular monthly weight gain is the most important sign of a child's overall health and development. It is the child's own weight gain which is important, not how the child compares in weight to other children.
It is therefore important to weigh young children every month. If a child does not gain weight over a two-month period, something is wrong. The child is being held back either by illness, or poor food, or lack of attention. Following are the most likely causes of poor growth, and the most important action parents can take to keep a child growing well.
Breastfeeding helps protect a baby from common illness and ensures its growth for the first few months. A full course of immunizations in the first year is also essential; it protects against disease, which cause undernutrition.
When additional foods are given, the risk of infection increases. It is important to check that the child is putting on weight regularly from one month to the next.
At the age of about six months, most infants need other foods in addition to breastmilk. Before the age of six months, an infant who is not gaining enough weight may need more frequent feeding. If the child is already being breastfed frequently, then failure to gain weight shows that other food in addition to milk are now necessary.
Boiled, peeled and mashed vegetables should be added to a young child's gruel or other food at least once a day. The greater the variety of food the child eats, the better.
A child under three years needs food five or six times a day. As a child's stomach is smaller than an adult's, so a child cannot eat as much as an adult at one meal. But its energy needs, for its size, are greater. So the problem is how to get enough 'energy food' into the child.
To solve such problem feed the child frequently five or six times a day. Enrich the child's gruel or porridge with mashed vegetables and a little oil or fat.
A child's food should not be left standing for hours. Germs can grow in it, which may make the child ill. As it is usually not possible to cook fresh food for a child five or six times a day, dried food or snacks should be given in between meals - fruits, bread, patties, biscuits, nuts, coconut, bananas or whatever clean food is easily available.
The family's normal food needs to be enriched to meet the special energy needs of the child. This means adding mashed vegetables and small amounts of fats or oil-butter, ghee, vegetable oil, coconut oil, corn oil, groundnuts oil, or crushed nuts.
All children need foods rich in vitamin A as it protects children against other illness such as diarrhoea. It should, therefore, be a part of every child's diet. Vitamin A comes from milk, dark green leafy vegetables and from orange or yellow fruits and vegetables such as carrots, papayas, and mangoes.
If a child has had diarrhoea or measles, vitamin A will be lost from the child's body. It can be replaced by feeding the child more fruits and vegetable.
One of the most important skills of parents is the skill of stopping illness from holding back a child's growth. In the times of illness, and especially if the illness is diarrhoea or measles, the appetite falls and less of the food that is eaten is absorbed into the body. If this happens several times a year, the child growth will be held back.
So it is essential to encourage a child who is ill to eat and drink. This can be difficult if the child does not want to eat, so it is important to keep offering food the child likes, usually soft, sweet foods, a little at a time and as often as possible.
When illness is over, extra meals should be given so that the child catches up on the growth lost. A good rule is to give a child an extra meal every day for at least a week after the illness is over. The child is not fully recovered from an illness until he or she is at least the same weight as when the illness began.
Therefore, it is important to protect a child's growth by preventing illness.
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