DETERMINANTS OF MALNUTRITION AMONG UNDER-FIVE CHILDREN: A CASE OF ARSI ZONE SELECTED WOREDAS IN OROMIA REGIONAL STATE, ETHIOPIA

Abstract

The study has been aimed to identify determinants associated with malnutrition of under-age five children with the use of cross-sectional data and probabilistic sampling method, anthropometric measurements of 997 sampled children under the age 6-59 months and information were taken from mothers/care givers of children on demographic, maternal factors, health seeking and nutritional factors. Multivariate logistic regression analyses were applied. The study revealed that The Prevalence of stunting, underweight and wasting was 43.4%, 27.1 % and 14.8%, respectively. On the levels of malnutrition by gender, the analyses indicate that stunting and underweight were higher among male than female children at 47.8%, 40.5%and 30.3%, 24.8% respectively. Whereas female children were slightly more wasting than their male counterparts. From the common forms of malnutrition such as stunting, wasting and underweight, stunting was the most common problem among under-five children in the woredas. Logistic regression analysis revealed that factors, such as age of a child, sex of a child, source of drinking water, type of toilet facility for household, mothers’ education, mothers’ occupation, mother’s age at first birth, child birth order, preceding birth interval of child, mother’s pre-natal and postnatal care visit, breast feeding duration of child, household size and child’s birth weight had statistically significant effect on the nutritional status of children under age five in the woredas. The empirical results of the overall findings underlines that the key determinants of child nutrition status are complex and interrelated, requiring a multilayered and all rounded interventions for improving the severity and ultimately alleviating the problem. The prevalence of stunting is high for the child who never breast feed at all. A child who feed breast milk for 13-24 months was less likely to be stunted than the reference category (>24 months). A source of drinking water is also found to be significant determinant of the child nutrition status measured WAZ. Specifically, the estimation result shows that children from households, who use safe water source, are less likely to be underweight than those who do not use safe water sources for drinking purpose. Child birth weight was also one of the significantly associated factors with nutritional status measured WHZ of children. With a decrease of birth weight of children, increase risk of being under-nutrition. Zonal Health Department and Woreda Health Office should be strengthening the health extension program to improve and provide necessary education on nutritional program, environmental sanitation, hygienic practice, breast feeding duration, and weaning practices. And allow mothers to attain their highest level of education and therefore improve the socio-economic status of mothers by giving them a good opportunity to have a better occupation.