Influence of Family Income on Food and Nutrient Intake among Elderly

Present study was conducted to study the influence of family income on food and nutrient intake among elderly. Thus 600 elderly population residing in urban (200), rural (200) and tribal area (200) of Nanded district of Marathwada region of Maharashtra state, were covered for the study. Anthropometric measurements i. e. height (cm. ), weight (kg. ), hip circumference (cm. ), waist circumference (cm. ) were recorded and body mass index was calculated using values of height and weight. Selected subjects were categorised under different grades of under nutrition on the basis of BMI. Two days dietary recall method and weighment was used to calculate food intake. The nutrient intake of the elderly was calculated by using food consumption table of ICMR (Gopalan et al. , 2004). To find out the percent adequacy in consumption food intake was compared with balanced diet and nutrient intake was compared with the ICMR recommended dietary allowances (ICMR 2012). Result showed that, among three residential areas height and weight ranged from 150.137.2 to 160.1313.97 and 44.779.43 to 61.029.08 i. e. among tribal low income group and urban high income group respectively. Among three income groups, majority percent of elderly were found to be normal, which ranged from 54.31 percent (low income) to 65.66 percent (high income). Most of the food stuffs was consumed more by high income group than other two income groups. Irrespective of income, highest adequacy was noted for sugar and jaggery and least adequacy was noted for roots and tubers. The values of intake of nutrients reported by low income group was lower than middle income and high income group. While, adequacy was found to be lowest in all three income groups for iron and calcium.