THE ASSOCIATION OF CALCIUM INTAKES AND PREMENSTRUATION SYNDROME AMONG TEENAGE GIRLS IN JAKARTA

Abstract

A recent study (Fikawati, 2005) shows that the intake of calcium among teenages in Bandung was
55.8% compared to Indonesian RDA aged 13-19 years (2004), in which for girl only accomplished
52.5% from Indonesian RDA. This indicates that teenage girls are vulnerable to the defiicency of
calcium. Calcium plays an important role to form teeth and bone. Furthermore, calcium is also
involving in cell function regulation as a neurotransmitter, muscle contraction and blood
coagulation, maintaining the cell membrane permeability and activator for enzyme reactions and
hormone secretion. Calcium may also reduce the syndrome that commonly occurs before
menstruation, usually called pre-menstruation syndrome (PMS). The cross sectional study was
conducted in July 2008 at State Yunior High School 232 Pisangan Timur, Eastern Jakarta. The
aim of the study is to analyze the relationship between calcium intake and PMS among yunior high
school girls students. The subjects were selected purposively and 95 subjects were chosen for the
study. The results showed that 90,5% of the subjects had calcium intake below the Indonesian
Recommended Dietary Allowance (IRDA) and most of them (88.4%) frequently experianced on
PMS. The analysis indicated that those who had experienced in PMS was those who had calcium
intake lower than 80% from IRDA. The analysis on the food source of calsium using Chi square
test shows that there is a significant relationship between consumption of tempeh and PMS.

Keywords: calcium intake, food pattern, PMS