Introduction: A large proportion of under-5 mortality in the world occurs in the sub- Saharan region and South East Asia and these deaths are mostly due to preventable diseases. Socio-economic status of the household, maternal education, maternal employment status, child‟s age and gender are said to be determinants of children‟s morbidity and mortality. An inverse relationship between illness, mortality and socioeconomic status has been observed with morbidity and mortality concentrated in children in the lower socio-economic class and substantial reductions occurring in higher socio-economic class.
Objectives: To determine the prevalence of all-cause morbidity, proportional morbidity from common illnesses and the maternal, household and community socio-demographic risk factors associated with morbidity in children under-5 years of age in the Agincourt health and Socio-Demographic Surveillance System (AHDSS) site, Mpumalanga Province, in 2006.
Methods: Secondary data analysis based on a child morbidity survey for children under-5 years was linked to the Agincourt Health and Socio-demographic Surveillance System site between August and December 2006. Caregivers of 6 404 children were administered a health care utilization questionnaire and 732 children were reported to have had an illness in the preceding 14 days. Stata version 10.0 was used for data handling, cleaning and statistical analysis.
Results: Nine percent of the children in the AHDSS site had had an illness in the 14 days preceding the survey. Illnesses due to other infections contributed to over half of the proportion of morbidity in the children. This was followed by fever, acute respiratory infections, malnutrition, gastro intestinal disease and lastly injuries. The 12-23 months age group had the highest proportion of morbidity due to malnutrition and gastro intestinal diseases compared to the other age groups, although this relationship was not significant. A significant difference in proportion of morbidity between children living in households headed by Mozambicans and those living in households headed by South Africans was found. A younger age, higher birthweight, living in a household headed by an individual with only (primary) and living in a community without a clinic increased the likelihood of a child being reported ill.
Conclusion: A younger age, higher birthweight, living with a household head with some education (primary and less) and poor access to a community health center in the village of residence increased the risk of a caregiver reporting a illness in a child. Confounding factors could have attributed to the observed association found between morbidity and high birthweight as well as that found between household head education status and morbidity. Further investigations as to why increase in household head education and higher birthweight is associated with morbidity is necessary. More research is needed to find out which factors at all levels (individual, household and community) unique to this region, contribute to making younger children more vulnerable to acquiring an illness.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:wits/oai:wiredspace.wits.ac.za:10539/10934 |
| Date | 10 January 2012 |
| Creators | Matabane, Mosehle Noriah |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
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