PREVALENCE OF ACUTE MALNUTRITION AND ITS ASSOCIATED FACTORS AMONG MOTHERS OF CHILDREN SUFFERING FROM SEVERE ACUTE MALNUTRITION IN THE TAMALE METROPOLIS.

Abstract

Malnutrition is one of the most devastating problems worldwide and is inextricably linked with poverty (Mandal S, et al. 2011). It is a major public health concern in many developing countries particularly for women responsible for a significant proportion of morbidity and mortality in the affected countries (Jeminusi OA, et al, 2015). Overall, 54 percent of Ghanaian women have a BMI in the normal range, 6 percent are thin (wasted), and 40 percent are overweight or obese. Five percent of women are classified as mildly thin (wasted), and 1 percent are moderately or severely thin (GDHS, 2014). According to the GDHS 2014, the prevalence of wasting (thinness) among women of reproductive age is the highest among all the 10 regions, the prevalence is 11.2% and the lowest being the central region at 3.5%. Malnutrition levels among children, adolescents and women are high in the Northern Region of Ghana as compared to other parts of the country especially the southern part and women in this part of the country play critical roles in the day to day general wellbeing of their households. The level of malnutrition among mothers in general in the Northern Region is not a well-documented problem and is without enough literature or data to indicate the magnitude of the problem. This study therefore sought to make a small contribution to this less studied area by assessing the nutritional status of only mothers of children who were already severely malnourished and are between the ages of 6 to 23 months. The steps taken in the research were to identify children 6 to 23 months with severe acute malnutrition, to screen the mothers of those children for acute malnutrition and finally to undertake a malnutrition causal analysis, using the results from the screening and the questionnaires administered during the interviews. The malnutrition causal analysis conducted used only data from the mothers who were malnourished to meet objectives of the study. Out of 265 mothers of all the children with SAM on admission for treatment who were purposefully selected for the anthropometry, 226 were available. The prevalence of malnutrition was determined to be 25.7% with none of the mothers having any history of illness in the past one month before the study. But a very high proportion (91.4%) of the malnourished mothers consumed poor quality diet. Household wealth index, mothers’ educational level, mothers’ nutrition knowledge and household size were found to be strongly associated (P<0.001) with the quality of maternal diet intake. The perception of 94.4% of the malnourished mothers confirm the findings of the research where they believe their poor nutritional status was due to insufficient consumption of adequate nutritious food.