Under-Nutrition

 Undernutrition denotes insufficient intake of nutrients to meet an individual's needs to maintain good health.Under-nutrition occurs when there is an inadequacy of both quality and quantity nutrients. 

• Protein -energy malnutrition (PEM) is the commonly known" type of under-nutrition which is seen in children. 
• In the development of undernutrition, the starting point is reduction in dietary intake. This can be due to psychiatric illness, anorexia associated with infection, liver disease, neoplasiq, drug interaction, nutrient deficiency, famine or starvation, upper intestinal disease, malabsorption or other losses from the body. This reduced dietary intake in turn leads to reduced mass, reduced requirement, reduced work, physiologic and metabolic changes, changes in body composition, and loss of tissue reserve. 

Factors 

• Starvation is one of the major reason for under-nutrition 
• It also results due to any kind of diseases like tuberculosis, diabetes, malabsorption syndrome or cancer. lnfection are common among them. 
• Anorexia nervosa is seen in girls more between the age of 15- 25 years where they reject food leading to severe weight loss. 
• Under weight occurs in people who are active, tense, nervous and who never take rest.