Anorexia nervosa among teenage girls: Emerging or prevalent?

Objectives: to find out frequency of anorexia nervosa (an) among teenage girls (tg) and to find out the knowledge and practice regarding anorexia nervosa among teenage girls. methods: a cross sectional study was conducted at higher secondary public school,rawalpindi from june 2013 till december 2013. a sample of 100 female students of the age group 13-19 years were inducted by systematic sampling technique. mixed pretested questionnaire was filled after informed verbal consent. data was entered and analysed using spss version 20. results: participants mean age was 15.81 + 1.323 years. mean weight,mean height and mean body mass index were found to be 50.34 + 10.445 kg,160.14 + 7.846 cm and 19.675 + 4.1477 kg/m2 respectively. anorexia nervosa was found in 42 (42%) teenage girls while 58 (58%) were not having anorexia nervosa. sufficient knowledge and positive practice were found to be present in 57 (57%) and 49 (49%) respectively. statistically no significant association was found between kp and an (p=0.73). conclusion: anorexia nervosa is an emerging health concern in pakistan. anorexia prevalent behaviour was observed in almost half of the teenage girls. © 2015,pakistan journal of medical sciences. all rights reserved.