Prevalence of malnutrition and associated factors among children aged 6-59 months in kizinda suburb bushenyi-ishaka municipality
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Date
2018-10
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Kampala International University. School of Health Sciences (Western Campus)
Abstract
Background: Globally, approximately 151 million children under 5 suffer from stunting and in 2017, nearly 51 million children under 5 were wasted. In Uganda, child malnutrition is one of the most serious public health problems and among the highest in the world with about 28.9% stunted and 3.6 % wasted in 2015. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to identify prevalence of malnutrition and determine the associated factors for malnutrition among children under the age of 5 years among children in Kizinda suburb, Bushenyi-Ishaka municipality.
Methods: A community based cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted. Data collection was done using a pretested questionnaire and the Emergency Nutrition Assessment software version 2015 was used to generate z-scores and the Weight for Height Z-scores (WHZ) were generated using WHO 2005 Growth Standards. The data was then exported to IBM SPSS version 25 for analysis.
Results: Malnutrition was found to be at 31.9% (n=135) and factors associated with malnutrition were, sex of the child where, female children were 4 times likely to be malnourished than boys (P=0.002; OR=3.620; 95%CI=1.560-8.385). Birth weight was statistically associated with malnutrition (P=<0.001; X2=18.19) and a child with small birth weight had 4 times the risk of being malnourished (OR=3.620; 95%CI=1.561-8.385). results further showed that children who had no history of illness had reduced risk of being malnourished have (OR=0.276; 95%CI=0.119-0.641). Both caretaker‟s education level and occupation were statistically significant at (P=<0.001, X2 =20.09) and (P=<0.001, X2=17.94) respectively.
Conclusion and recommendations: This study found out that prevalence of malnutrition was high (31.9%). Among the factors that were investigated, sex of the child, birth weight, history of infectious disease, caretaker‟s education and occupation were all significantly associated with malnutrition. A strong nutrition specific and sensitive intervention should be implemented in the study area with a special focus on supporting housewives, promoting education on child feeding and nutrition.
Description
Research dissertation submitted to the faculty of clinical medicine and dentistry in partial fulfillment for the award of the degree of bachelor in medicine and surgery at kampala international university
Keywords
Prevalence of malnutrition, Associated factors among children aged 6-59 months