Abstract:
Background: Acute malnutrition (wasting) poses a major threat to a child's life and development, as
well as an increased chance of mortality. Orphans are at higher risk of developing malnutrition
because of poor food provision and a lack of medical and social care. However, there is a dearth of
evidence on the nutritional status of school-age orphans and vulnerable children in our study area.
Objective: To assess the prevalence of acute malnutrition and its associated factors among
institutionalized school-aged orphaned and vulnerable children in Jigjiga Town, Somali region,
eastern Ethiopia, from June 15-30, 2024.
Methods: An institutional-based cross-sectional study was conducted among 161 randomly selected
school-aged orphaned and vulnerable children aged 6–12 years living in Jigjiga Boarding and Jafar Boarding schools in Jigjiga Town, Somali regional state, eastern Ethiopia. Data was collected using
structured and pretested questionnaires and anthropometric measurements. Data was entered into
Epi-data version 3.1 and exported to SPSS version 23 for data cleaning and analysis. Multivariate
analysis using a logistic regression model was computed to identify factors associated with acute
malnutrition (wasting). Statistical significance was declared at p-value <0.05.
Results: Overall, the prevalence of acute malnutrition (wasting) among institutionalized school-aged
orphans and vulnerable children in the study area was 24.20 (95% CI: 18.19, 31.49). Factors such as
ages between 6 and 7 years (AOR = 9.21, 95% CI: 1.40, 16.67), who had an acute illness in the past
two weeks (AOR = 10.01, 95% CI: 2.83, 23.45), who did not eat breakfast yesterday (AOR = 4.33,
95% CI: 1.30, 14.44), and who never consumed vegetables and fruits (AOR = 9.55, 95% CI: 1.80,
1.51- 15.64) were significantly associated with acute malnutrition (wasting) among school-aged
orphan children.
Conclusions: - The finding from this study indicated that one out of four institutionalized school aged orphans and vulnerable children in the study area was wasted. Therefore, implementing
programs of the Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMC) clinic, applying growth
monitoring assessment regularly, and properly following and providing nutritional meals at orphan
schools would be enormous in reducing and intervening in the acute malnutrition among orphan
children.
