Factors associated with undernutrition among pregnant women in Haramaya district, Eastern Ethiopia: A community-based study

Meseret Belete Fite; Abera Kenay Tura; Tesfaye Assebe Yadeta; Lemessa Oljira; Kedir Teji Roba

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0282641

Factors associated with undernutrition among pregnant women in Haramaya district, Eastern Ethiopia: A community-based study

PLoS One. 2023 Mar 9;18(3):e0282641. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0282641. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Meseret Belete Fite¹, Abera Kenay Tura^{2

3}, Tesfaye Assebe Yadeta², Lemessa Oljira⁴, Kedir Teji Roba²

Affiliations

¹ Department of Public Health, Institute of Health Sciences, Wollega University, Nekemte, Ethiopia.
² School of Nursing and Midwifery, College of Health and Medical Sciences, Haramaya University, Harar, Ethiopia.
³ Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, University Medical Centre Groningen, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.
⁴ School of Public Health, College of Health and Medical Sciences, Haramaya University, Harar, Ethiopia.

Abstract

Introduction: Although undernutrition in pregnancy has continued to get global attention as pregnancy is considered a critical period in the life cycle owed to increase the metabolic and physiological demands, evidence is scarce on undernutrition and associated factors among pregnant women in eastern Ethiopia. Therefore, this study assessed the undernutrition and associated factors among pregnant women in Haramaya district, Eastern Ethiopia.

Methods: A community-based cross-sectional study was conducted among randomly selected pregnant women in Haramaya district, eastern Ethiopia. Data were collected through face-to-face interviews, anthropometric measurement, and hemoglobin analysis by trained research assistants. An adjusted Prevalence ratio (aPR), and a 95% confidence interval (CI), were used to report associations. Poisson regression analysis model with a robust variance estimate identified variables associated with undernutrition. Data were double entered using Epi-data 3.1 and cleaned, coded, checked for missing and outliers, and analyzed using Stata 14 (College Station, Texas 77845 USA. Finally, the p-value <0.05 was the cut-off point for the significant association.

Results: A total of 448 pregnant women with a mean age of 25.68 (± 5.16) were included in the study. The prevalence of undernutrition among pregnant women was 47.9% (95% CI: 43%-53%). From the analysis, the undernutrition was more likely higher among respondents who had five or more family members (APR = 1.19; 95% CI = 1.02-1.40), lower dietary diversity (APR = 1.58; 95% CI = 1.13-2.21) and those who were anemic (APR = 4.27; 95% CI = 3.17-5.76).

Conclusion: Nearly half of the pregnant women in study area were undernourished. High prevalence was found among women who had large family sizes, low dietary diversity and anemia during pregnancy. Improving dietary diversity, strengthening family planning services and giving special attention to pregnant women, supplementation of iron and folic acid, and early detection and treatment of anemia is essential to improve the high burden of undernutrition and the adverse effect on pregnant women and the fetus.

Copyright: © 2023 Fite et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Adult
Anemia* / epidemiology
Cross-Sectional Studies
Ethiopia / epidemiology
Female
Humans
Malnutrition* / epidemiology
Pregnancy
Pregnant Women
Prenatal Care
Prevalence

Grants and funding

This study was fully funded by Haramaya University after the proposal has been defended. The funder has no role in conception, design of the study, statistical analysis, result interpretation and in writing up the manuscript. The funding institution has no role in the publication consent or approval.