Risk Factors Associated with Multimorbidity among Children Aged Under-Five Years in Sub-Saharan African Countries: A Scoping Review

Phillips Edomwonyi Obasohan; Stephen J Walters; Richard Jacques; Khaled Khatab

doi:10.3390/ijerph20021377

Risk Factors Associated with Multimorbidity among Children Aged Under-Five Years in Sub-Saharan African Countries: A Scoping Review

Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2023 Jan 12;20(2):1377. doi: 10.3390/ijerph20021377.

Authors

Phillips Edomwonyi Obasohan^{1

2}, Stephen J Walters¹, Richard Jacques¹, Khaled Khatab³

Affiliations

¹ School of Health and Related Research (ScHARR), University of Sheffield, Sheffield S1 4AD, UK.
² Department of Liberal Studies, College of Business and Administrative Studies, Niger State Polytechnic, Bida Campus, Bida 912231, Nigeria.
³ Faculty of Health and Wellbeing, Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield S10 2BP, UK.

Abstract

Background/purpose: Globally, the prevalence of multimorbidity (defined as the cooccurrence of two or more diseases in an individual without reference to an index disease) is greater than 33%. Consequently, childhood multimorbidity, a growing public health concern in Low- and Middle-Income-Countries (LMICs), frequently has an impact on children's health. Therefore, the aim of this scoping review was to locate and describe studies that investigate the association between socioeconomic, demographic, and environmental factors and the prevalence of multimorbidity among children aged under five years in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

Methods/design: We searched MEDLINE, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science for papers written in English, and published between January 1990 and March 2022. The search included papers that focused on children aged under five years with multimorbidity from Sub-Saharan Africa and used classical regression methods in their analysis.

Results: A total of 261 articles were identified. Out of the 66 articles selected for full-text reading, 60 were removed for various reasons. Therefore, data from a sample of six articles were finally extracted and reported in this study. The sample size for the 6 studies included ranged from 2343 to 193,065 children under five years of age. There were six distinct disease conditions (Pneumonia, diarrhoea, malaria, being overweight, stunting, and anaemia) analysed in the included studies. One of the studies had three concurrent diseases, while the other five studies had two current diseases as their multimorbidity outcome of interest. The prevalence of multimorbidity in these six studies ranged from 1.2% to 24.8%.

Conclusions: The relatively few studies found in this research area is an indication of an evidence deficit/knowledge gap yearning to be filled to help policymakers in coming up with integrated multimorbidity care for children in SSA.

Keywords: multimorbidity; scoping review; sub-Saharan Africa; under-five years.

Publication types

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

MeSH terms

Africa South of the Sahara / epidemiology
Child
Child Health*
Child, Preschool
Growth Disorders
Humans
Multimorbidity*
Risk Factors

Grants and funding

This study is an integral part of P.E.O.’s doctoral study at the School of Health and Related Research of the University of Sheffield, United Kingdom. The funding for the doctoral study was granted by TETFUND (Nigeria).