Dietary Practices of patients with Pulmonary Tuberculosis Attending Clinic at Kericho County Referral Hospital- Kenya

Abstract

Introduction: Dietary practice is one of the major factors that influence the nutritional status of a pulmonary (PTB) patient. Feeding complications like lack of appetite, vomiting, and nausea, increase the chances of an individual not meeting their recommended dietary allowance (RDA) and being undernourished. Poor dietary intake leads to poor prognosis of TB which will in turn affect the nutrition status of the patient. The main aim of this study was to investigate dietary practices among PTB patients attending the TB clinic at Kericho County Referral Hospital (KCRH).

Methods: The study adopted a cross-sectional descriptive design. Systematic random sampling was used to select study participants. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data from PTB patients aged 18 years and above (N=175).  Data were entered into Microsoft excel 2010 for cleaning and analyzed using SPSS version 24.0 software. Nutri-survey was used to analyze data on 24-hour recall. Ethical approval was sought from Kabarak University Research Ethics Committee (KUREC), research permits were sought from National Commission on Science, Technology & Innovation (NACOSTI) and research authorization was obtained from KCRH. Informed consent was obtained from all study participants before the commencement of data collection. Data were handled safely from the collection and analysis to storage.

Results: The majority of PTB patients were male, aged between 21-30 years with secondary school education, and had had TB for 1-2 months. Consumption of macronutrients was average despite the relative availability of food sources for most households. Mean carbohydrate, protein, and fat intake was 300.2g/day & 279g/day, 75.1g/day & 63.8g/day, and 55.6g/day & 51.7g/day for male and female subjects respectively in each category. The mean energy intake was 2001.2 kcal/day and 1860 kcal/day for male and female subjects respectively which is below the RDA for TB patients based on ministry of health (MoH) recommendations. Results showed inadequate intake of micronutrients by study respondents. Most of the participants consumed an average of >4 meals per day. Study participants who had a high DDS (>6) mostly consumed cereals, oils & fats, vegetables as well as milk & milk products.

Conclusion: Most of the participants had a diverse diet but did not meet their energy, macronutrient, and micronutrient requirements.

Recommendation: Counselling on good dietary practices should be incorporated as one of the key interventions in the management of PTB. Nutrition support should be provided for PTB patients to meet their energy requirements.

Keywords: dietary practices, dietary diversity, meal frequency, macronutrient, micronutrient