The Prevalence of Stunting and Associated Factors among Children Under Five years of age in Southern Ethiopia: Community Based Cross-Sectional Study

Background: According to the Ethiopian Mini Demographic Health survey (EMDHS) of 2019, about 37% of children under five years of age are stunted. Data are scarce on stunting in the study area. Objective: This study was aimed to assess the prevalence and factors associated with stunting in among children under five years of age in southern Ethiopia. Method: A community-based cross-sectional study was conducted among 660 randomly selected under five child-mother pairs. The study was conducted from December 1 to 30, 2018 using a structured pretested questionnaire and anthropometric measurement tools. A simple random sampling technique was used to select study participants. Data were entered into EpiData version 3.1 and analyzed by Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20 and Emergency Nutrition Assessment (ENA) for Standardizing Monitoring and Assessment of Relief and Transition (SMART) 2011 software. Variables with P-value < 0.25 during the bivariate were entered into multivariable logistic regression analysis and significant association with stunting was declared at P-value < 0.05 with 95% CI. Result: Prevalence of stunting among children under five years of age was 37.7%. Factors: family size less than five [AOR = 0.59; 95% CI (0.37, 0.97)], age less than 11 months [AOR = 0.17; 95% CI (0.08, 0.4)] and rich wealth status [AOR = 0.46; 95% CI (0.27, 0.79)] had a protective effect, while source of drinking water like river water [AOR = 5.11; 95% CI (1.6, 16.4)], presence of two or more under five children in the household [AOR = 1.72; 95% CI (1.07, 2.77)], undiversified diet [AOR = 1.82; (1.17, 2.83)] and household food insecurity [AOR = 1.83; 95% CI (1.13, 2.96)] increased the risk of stunting. Conclusion and recommendation: The prevalence of stunting was high. Child age, family size, number of children under five years of age in the household, wealth status, source of drinking water, undiversified diet, and household food insecurity were associated with stunting. Thus, efforts should be made to improve nutritional status through strengthening of nutrition education, promotion of different family planning methods to limit the family size, involvment in different income generating activities to improve wealth status, securing of household food, use of improved sources of water, and nutrition education to diversify child diet. Further longitudinal study is recommended for researchers.