EFFECT OF CRICKET ENRICHED PORRIDGE AND NUTRITION EDUCATION ON GROWTH AND GUT HEALTH OF INFANTS AND YOUNG CHILDREN IN ALEGO USONGA, SIAYA COUNTY

Abstract

Globally about 45% of all deaths in children is attributed to undernutrition. Children who survive severe undernutrition suffer long-term growth retardation. There is a growing interest in insects for alleviation of malnutrition due to their energy density, protein quality, vitamins and mineral contents. Insects can potentially replace dairy and flesh in complementary foods (CFs) in food insecure settings. In this study, infants 6 months old were exposed to daily serving of insect-based CF for 8 months, with their mothers exposed to nutrition education were evaluated for linear growth as primary outcome. Secondary outcomes included skinfolds and dietary diversity. The study was an experimental randomized controlled trial with 4 study arms. It enrolled 284 mother infant dyads, randomly assigned to the study arms at Rwambwa Sub-County Hospital. Each dyad was assigned to a combination of the two treatments: Cricket treatment (+/-CR), and Nutrition Education treatment (+/-ED). The study CFs were provided monthly as take-home rations adjusted for age, while +NE sessions were monthly personalized audio-visual sessions with both education messages and reminder sent to the mother’s mobile phones. Monthly, infant anthropometric, feeding practices and child health data were collected using structured questionnaires. Gut health at baseline was tested in a random sample of 40 infants using 13C-Sucrose breath test. Both study CFs had high acceptability rate of 98.3% and 99.2% for +CR and -CR respectively. The researcher observed a significant (Z=-0.28 (p=0.03)) height-for-age z-score (HAZ) effect between -CR and +CR with no significant change in height on either cricket or education treatment. Signifying a relatively similar growth rate in terms of absolute height. Nutrition education to mothers significantly improved the weight-for-height (WHZ), irrespective of CFs consumed by a magnitude of 0.45 WHZ-score. Those suffering more than 3 episodes of illness were significantly (p=0.03) associated with at least a four times likelihood of suffering acute malnutrition as noted by low middle upper arm circumference (MUAC). Girls were significantly (p=0.01) 1.98 times likely to be malnourished by MUAC compared to boys at end-line. The mean cumulative % 13C sucrose dose recovered in a breath at 90 min from stunted infants was lower compared to the non stunted. It is supposed that high breastfeeding rates combined with the small difference in nutrients composition, limited detection of difference in absolute linear growth and stunting effect. Concluding, this similarity in growth rate in all study arms suggest the potential of insects in providing healthy protein comparative to the super cereal. The study recommends, uptake of safe, deliciously prepared cricket porridge to enhance diet diversity, with a call for research on gut health for more insight on their contribution to human growth. Key words: infants, insects, crickets, complementary feeding, linear growth, gut health