Statistical Analysis on Nutritional Status and its Associated Factors of Under Five Years Children in Nepal

Abstract

A B S T R A C TMalnutrition among under five year of age group is a major underlying cause of the child morbidity and mortality in many developing countries like Nepal. Nutritional status of children is a proxy indicator for assessing the health status of entire population. This study was carried out to evaluate the nutritional status of the most vulnerable age group of children (0-59 months) and to identify different factors associated with it. Generally three anthropometric indicators were often used to assess the nutritional status of children height-for-age, weight-for-height and weight-for-age. This study is based on data of Nepal Demographic and Health Survey. WHO Anthro software and IBM SPSS 20 were used to analyze the data. The prevalence of the malnutrition (stunted, wasted and underweight) was found in the different aspect. This study consists of 2334 children of under five years age groups, out of this 50.9% were male children and 49.1% were female children, the prevalence of the stunted is 41%, wasted 29% and underweight 11%. The prevalence of diarrhea during the data collection period is 13.80% and prevalence of fever during the data collection period is 18.70%. The statistically significant factor were body mass index of mother, wealth index, size of child at birth and education of mother and smoking habit of mother. Malnutrition (stunted, wasted and underweight) still remains as a major health problem in our country Nepal. So, our government should be focused on those factors which are significantly associated with malnutrition like health care during pregnancy period, education of mother etc. Significant number of under-five children's of Nepal was malnourished. Maternal factors have significant association with nutritional status of the children which include extra diet in pregnancy and lactation, iron supplements in pregnancy, exclusive breast feeding for six months.

Nutritional status and its associated factors among under five years Muslim children of Kapilvastu district, Nepal

“…Similarly female were 0.82 times less likely to be stunted in another study conducted in Ethiopia by using 2016 Ethiopia demographic and health survey [ 72 ]. Residential status in this study was significantly associated with stunting which is in concordance with several other studies [ 51 , 63 , 64 , 71 , 73 ]. In the present study stunting was less prevalent in the children who were living in joint and extended family, however in contrast to this study another study conducted in urban slums of Maharastra India [ 54 ] found less prevalent of stunting among children living in nuclear family.…”

“…Nearly two third of the children in this study were stunted which is in line with another study conducted in Rupandehi [ 40 ] and Kapilvastu district of Nepal [ 47 ]. However, in contrast to this study other studies such as study conducted in severely food-insecure households in Nepal [ 46 ], rural and urban Nepal [ 28 , 48 – 51 ], tribal population in Assam India [ 53 ], urban slums and rural area of Maharashtra, India [ 54 ], semi-pastoral communities of Tanzania, eastern Ethiopia [ 55 ] found lower proportion of under five children were stunted [ 7 ]. However, higher proportion of underweight was also found in some studies, such as study conducted at a Teaching Hospital in Bobo-Dioulasso, Burkina Faso found more than three fourth of HIV infected under five years children were stunted [ 56 ].…”

“…The finding of this study revealed that half of the children were underweight which is in line with another community based cross-sectional study conducted among two hundred ninety two under five children in Rupandehi district of Nepal which found that nearly half (45.9%) of the children were underweight [40]. However, in contrast to this study, several other studies conducted in Nepal such as study conducted by analyzing 12, 674 data from Nepal Demographic and Health Survey (NDHS 2011) focusing severely food-insecure households in Nepal [46], rural and urban Nepal [28,[47][48][49][50][51][52]. Similarly, several studies conducted in India such as community-based cross-sectional study conducted among 500 children of tribal population in Assam India [53], community-based cross-sectional study conducted at urban slums and rural area in two districts of Maharashtra, India among 3671 under five children [54].…”

Factors Associated with Children Ever Born: A Case Study of Somadi Village Development Committee of Palpa District, Nepal

“…In terms of arable land per person, it crosses 181 persons per square kilometre [2]. The rapid population growth has an adverse effect on overall socioeconomic development as well as malnutrition in children [3]. The high and constant level population growth rate is considered as the main obstacle to sustainable development of the country.…”

Binary Logistic Regression Model for Assessing Factors Associated with Nutritional Status of Children Under Five Years among Chepang Community in Siddi, Chitwan, Nepal

“…Wealth quintile and mothers education (MOH, 2017), size of the family (Pokhrel, Parajuli & Acharya, 2018), wealth index, size of the child at birth, ANC checkups, education, and sex of a child (Upadhyay & Bhusal, 2017) were significant variables for determining the Nutritional status of Children under 5 years. In this study, external family income (wealth index related factor), gender, number of children below 14 years at home and mother's literacy are significant for nutritional status of children in Chepang community, this leads that the determining factors for nutritional status under five years of age are similar in Chepang community and in other communities' children of Nepal.…”