Background: Stunting is a result of chronic under nutrition and a major public health issue in Ethiopia. This study aimed to calculate the prevalence of stunting, and associated factors among children younger than five years. Methods: A total of 9588 children in Ethiopia were included. Proportional Odds Model was used to identify determinants of stunting. The score test and plots were used to see the proportional odds model assumptions. Results: The prevalence of stunting was 38% (21% moderately, 17% severely). Children with illiterate mothers were 2 times more likely to be moderately and severely stunted compared with their counterparts with secondary education. The odds of being stunted for children whose age group 24-35 months respectively as compared to children 0-5 months of age were 4.71 times higher. Being female children were 9.66 times more likely to be in normal nutrition status as compared to male. Children of families in the highest wealth quintile were 7.92 times more likely to have normal stature compared with children from poorest ones. Conclusions: Child age, child sex, birth interval, mother's educational status, wealth index, were the important determinants of stunting. Addressing these factors will help to prevent future injury of physical and mental development in children and will assist in alleviating malnutrition and refining their quality of life. Moreover, in a DHS data set, complex sampling design should be incorporated in order to make a valid statistical inference.

ObjectiveLongitudinal data are often collected to study the evolution of biomedical markers. The study of the joint evolution of response variables concerning hypertension over time was the aim of this paper. A hospital based retrospective data were collected from September 2014 to August 2015 to identify factors that affect hypertensive. The joint mixed effect model with unstructured covariance was fitted. A total of 172 patients screened for antihypertensive drugs treated were longitudinally considered from Felege Hiwot referral.ResultsThe joint mixed effect model with unstructured covariance (AIC: 12,236.9 with  = 1007.8, P < 10−4) was significantly best fit to the data. The correlation between the evolutions of DBP and SBP was 0.429 and the evolution of the association between responses over-time was found 0.257. Among all covariates included in joint-mixed-effect-models, sex, residence, related disease and time were statistically significant on evolution of systolic and diastolic blood pressure. The joint modeling of longitudinal bivariate responses is necessary to explore the association between paired response variables like systolic and diastolic blood pressure. Fitting joint model with modern computing method is recommended to address questions for association of the evolutions with better accuracy.

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BackgroundUnintended pregnancy related to unmet need is a worldwide problem that affects societies. The main objective of this study was to identify the prevalence and determinants of unmet need for family planning among women aged (15–49) in Ethiopia.MethodsThe Performance Monitoring and Accountability2020/Ethiopia was conducted in April 2016 at round-4 from 7494 women with two-stage-stratified sampling. Bi-variable and multi-variable binary logistic regression model with complex sampling design was fitted.ResultsThe prevalence of unmet-need for family planning was 16.2% in Ethiopia. Women between the age range of 15–24 years were 2.266 times more likely to have unmet need family planning compared to above 35 years. Women who were currently married were about 8 times more likely to have unmet need family planning compared to never married women. Women who had no under-five child were 0.125 times less likely to have unmet need family planning compared to those who had more than two-under-5.ConclusionThe key determinants of unmet need family planning in Ethiopia were residence, age, marital-status, education, household members, birth-events and number of under-5 children. Thus the Government of Ethiopia would take immediate steps to address the causes of high unmet need for family planning among women.

BackgroundEthiopia is among countries with low contraceptive usage prevalence rate and resulted in high total fertility rate and unwanted pregnancy which intern affects the maternal and child health status. This study aimed to investigate the major factors that affect the number of modern contraceptive users at service delivery point in Ethiopia.MethodsThe Performance Monitoring and Accountability2020/Ethiopia data collected between March and April 2016 at round-4 from 461 eligible service delivery points were in this study. The weighted log-linear negative binomial model applied to analyze the service delivery point’s data.ResultsFifty percent of service delivery points in Ethiopia given service for 61 modern contraceptive users with the interquartile range of 0.62. The expected log number of modern contraceptive users at rural was 1.05 (95% Wald CI: − 1.42 to − 0.68) lower than the expected log number of modern contraceptive users at urban. In addition, the expected log count of modern contraceptive users at others facility type was 0.58 lower than the expected log count of modern contraceptive users at the health center. The numbers of nurses/midwives were affecting the number of modern contraceptive users. Since, the incidence rate of modern contraceptive users increased by one due to an additional nurse in the delivery point.ConclusionAmong different factors considered in this study, residence, region, facility type, the number of days per week family planning offered, the number of nurses/midwives and number of medical assistants were to be associated with the number of modern contraceptive users. Thus, the Government of Ethiopia would take immediate steps to address causes of the number of modern contraceptive users in Ethiopia.