Maternal psychiatric morbidity and childhood malnutrition

Objective: to determine maternal psychiatric morbidity and its relation with malnutrition in their children. methodology: it was a case control study conducted at nutrition rehabilitation unit of department of pediatrics, civil hospital karachi, pakistan from march to september 2011. samples included hundred children between 3 to 36 months of age. the number of cases and control were fifty each. children with moderate and severe malnutrition according to who classification were included in the case group whereas controls were children of the same age group and normal weight, coming to the department with common illnesses like acute respiratory infections, diarrhea, during the same time period. mothers of both groups were screened for a probable psychiatric morbidity using hads; “the hospital anxiety and depression scale”, a psychiatric screening instrument. the score of more than eleven on either sub scale of hads was considered significant for presence of psychiatric illness in the mothers. data was analyzed through spss 15. statistical analysis of data was done by using odds ratio, stratification and logistic regression for each variable in both case and control groups. results: maternal hads score was significantly high >21 in 50% of cases whereas in controls it was 46% (o.r=0.85 (95%cl=0.38-1.86). of the malnourished 90% and controls, 84% belong to low income status or=1.71 (95% ci 0.52-5.6) whereas low birth weight was 64% in cases and 56% in controls or=1.39 (95% cl 0.62-3.11). conclusion: maternal mental health affects the nutritional status of the children. anxiety and depression are common psychiatric illnesses found in our society as suggested by significantly high hads scores of mothers in both cases and control groups. it also shows that it is difficult to establish a straightforward relationship between maternal psychiatric illnesses and poor nutritional status of their children. however increasing age of mothers, low birth weight of child, increasing family size and low income are associated important risk factors for predicting increasing hads scores in mothers of malnourished children.