To determine age of appearance of secondary sexual character and age of menarche in working girls of urban slum area

Abstract

Introduction: Adolescence is the developmental phase between childhood and adulthood with specific psychological attributes. In normal girl evidence of sexual maturation characteristically appears not at four or forty, but at 8 or 10 or 12 years of age. At that time, most healthy girls begin to have physical manifestation of the changes in ovarian function that are associated with reproductive maturity. Their breasts start to bud, and hair appears in the pubic and axillary regions. The timely appearance of the menarche gives assurance that the other less recognizable feature of puberty and early adolescence are processing normally or about to be initiated.

Method: A cross sectional survey was done by door to door visit in three randomly selected slums of Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh, India. Data was collected on predesigned and pretested pro-forma with the answer to questionnaire regarding various aspects. SMR staging done by taking consent from guardian of minor adolescents and consent from their selves in those who are above 18 years.

Result: Out of 696 girls who were examined, it was found that the maximum number (45.40%) of adolescents were in 10-13 years age group and minimum number (27.01%) were in 17-19 years age group. In 14-16 years 27.58% girls. In SMR staging of 10-13 years age group max girls (39.8%) were in B1 and 55.6%in P1 and no one in B5 and P5.In 14-16 years age group max (45.8%) in B4, and only 1.0% in B1 and max in P3 and minimum in P1 that is 38.5% and 5.2% respectively. In 17-19 years, age group max has reached stage B5 with 94.6% and P5 72.3%. The Mean age of menarche for all age group was 13.19 years.

Conclusion: Nutritional, socioeconomic status, climate, genetic makeup affects age of menarche and pubertal changes knowing the fact that working adolescent from slum will have more nutritional deprived thus can be concluded that poor nutrition and lower socioeconomic status might be responsible for this delay.