Abstract:
Background: Pneumonia causes about two million deaths among under five years children, accounting for nearly one in five child death globally. In Ethiopia the number of pneumonia deaths in children under 5 years was 30,733 and also 9.4 death rates per 1000 Live Births. Objective: To assess the magnitude of pneumonia and associated factors among under-five years age children in Debre Berhan Referral Hospital, North Shoa Zone, Ethiopia. Method: An institutional based cross sectional study was conducted on 341 participants from March to April 2019.Systematic random sampling technique was applied to select participant. Data was collected by interview method using structured and pre-tested questionnaire. To control data quality data collectors and supervisor was trained for one day and pretest was done on 5 % of a sample size, and completeness and consistencies of questionnaires was checked. Then data was entered in to Epi Data version 4.4.2.1 and exported to SPSS version 23 for further analysis. All variables used in the bivariate analysis and variables with P-values less than 0.25 candidate for multivariate analysis to control confounding variable and to determine predictors of pneumonia. Crude odds ratio and adjusted odds ratio were computed with a 95% confidence interval (CI) and p-value <0.05 was considered to declare statistically significant association. Result: The magnitude of pneumonia among under five children was 39.6% (95% CI (34.6-45.4). MUAC(P= 0.002, AOR= 2.892), type of solid fuel used in the houes hold (P= 0.008, AOR= 3.666) , presence of chimney in the kitchen (P= 0.001, AOR= 3.662), place of child during cooking (P= 0.000, AOR= 5.562),vitamin A supplementation (P= 0.001, AOR= 3.22),and duration of breast feeding (P= 0.015, AOR= 2.332) were predictors of pneumonia. Conclusion and Recommendation: The present study found that the magnitude of pneumonia was high in the study area.MUAC, type of fuel used, presence of chimney in the kitchen, place of child during cooking,vitamin A Supplementation and duration of breast feeding were the predictors of pneumonia in under-five children.Therefore,occurrence of pneumonia could be reduced by improved living and environmental conditions,increase awareness regarding indoor air pollution and also nutrition of children.
