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Association between the socioeconomic determinants and soil-transmitted helminthiasis among school-going children in a rural area of Haryana
Rohit Dhaka1, Ramesh Verma2, Aparna Parmar3, Vinod Chayal2, Meenakshi Kalhan2, Kapil Bhalla4, Suraj Chawla5, Ginni Agrawal2, Gopal Kumar2, Aman Sachdeva2
1 Department of Community Medicine, ESIC Medical College and Hospital Faridabad, Nalhar, Nuh, India
2 Department of Community Medicine, Pt B D Sharma PGIMS Rohtak, Nalhar, Nuh, India
3 Microbiology, Pt B D Sharma PGIMS Rohtak, Nalhar, Nuh, India
4 Department of Pediatrics, Pt B D Sharma PGIMS Rohtak, Nalhar, Nuh, India
5 Department of Community Medicine, SHKM Government Medical College, Nalhar, Nuh, India
Correspondence Address:
Dr. Vinod Chayal
Department of Community Medicine, Pt B D Sharma, PGIMS, Rohtak - 124 001, Haryana
India
 Source of Support: None, Conflict of Interest: None  | Check |
DOI: 10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_383_20
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Background: WHO indicates that India has the highest burden of soil-transmitted helminthiasis (STH) in the world, contributing to 25% of the total global cases, with 220 million children aged 1–14 estimated to be at risk. Aim and Objective: To study the association between the socioeconomic factors and STHs among primary school children in a rural area of Haryana. Methodology: The study was conducted among children aged 6–10 years studying in the rural government primary schools in the rural areas of Haryana. A total of 300 children were enrolled from government school. Results: The study found that the prevalence of helminthiasis was 28.7% (86/300) and of these 14.0% children were infected with Ascaris lumbricoides and sex wise association with Helminthic infection was observed as statistically nonsignificant. One third of the (31.39%; 27/86) children were pallor and 5.81% subjects were having Bitot's spot while 13.95% children were having constitutional symptoms such as weakness, 6.97% subjects have fatigue, and 5.81% children have body ache. Discussion: The morbidity can be reduced with appropriate inputs to improve the environmental factors. This may need investment for sanitary latrines, food hygiene, and safe drinking water, anti-helminthic drugs, and health education. Conclusion and Recommendations: The results of the study concluded and recommended that proper implementation of national deworming day and other long-term strategies like sanitation, clean drinking water, adequate sanitation, and also improvement in nutritional status through various nutritional health programmes.
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