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Accounting for recent trends in the prevalence of diarrhoea in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) : results from consecutive cross-sectional surveys
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Emina Be-Ofuriyua, Jacques and Kandala, Ngianga-Bakwin (2012) Accounting for recent trends in the prevalence of diarrhoea in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) : results from consecutive cross-sectional surveys. BMJ Open, Vol.2 (No.6). e001930. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2012-001930 ISSN 2044-6055.
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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2012-001930
Abstract
Objectives: To analyse trends in diarrhoea prevalence by maternal education, access to clean water and improved sanitation, household wealth index; to identify the sources of variation and assess contribution of changes in socioeconomic characteristics in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
Design: Consecutive cross-sectional surveys.
Setting: DRC.
Participants: The databases contain information on 9748 children from the 2001 Multiple Indicators Cluster Survey and 7987 children from the 2007 Demographic and Health Survey.
Interventions: N/A.
Primary and secondary outcome measures Whether the child had diarrhoea 14 days preceding the survey.
Results: The overall prevalence of diarrhoea decreased by 26 percent (from 22.1% in 2001 to 16.4% in 2007). Findings from the three complementary statistical methods are consistent and confirm a significant decrease in diarrhoea regardless of socioeconomic characteristics. Changes in behaviour and/or in public health policy seem to be the likely main source of the change. There were no significant changes in diarrhoea prevalence associated with variation of the population structure. It is worth mentioning that the decrease in diarrhoea prevalence is in contrast to the generalised poor living conditions of the population. Therefore, it is difficult to ascertain whether the decline in diarrhoea prevalence was due to real improvement in public-health policy or to data quality issues.
Conclusions: The decline of diarrhoea prevalence in our study need to be further investigated by conducting district-based or provincial-based studies to validate findings from household surveys such as Demographic and Health Surveys and Multiple Indicators Cluster Survey taking into account the current context of the country: ongoing conflict, poor socioeconomic and poor health infrastructure. However, improvement in living conditions such as access to clean water and improved sanitation will contribute to accelerate the reduction of diarrhoea prevalence as well as reduction of child mortality.
Item Type: | Journal Article | ||||
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Subjects: | R Medicine > RA Public aspects of medicine | ||||
Divisions: | Faculty of Science, Engineering and Medicine > Medicine > Warwick Medical School > Health Sciences > Population, Evidence & Technologies (PET) > Warwick Evidence Faculty of Science, Engineering and Medicine > Medicine > Warwick Medical School > Health Sciences Faculty of Science, Engineering and Medicine > Medicine > Warwick Medical School |
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Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): | Diarrhea -- Congo (Democratic Republic), Congo (Democratic Republic) -- Economic conditions, Congo (Democratic Republic) -- Social conditions | ||||
Journal or Publication Title: | BMJ Open | ||||
Publisher: | BMJ | ||||
ISSN: | 2044-6055 | ||||
Official Date: | 2012 | ||||
Dates: |
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Volume: | Vol.2 | ||||
Number: | No.6 | ||||
Page Range: | e001930 | ||||
DOI: | 10.1136/bmjopen-2012-001930 | ||||
Status: | Peer Reviewed | ||||
Publication Status: | Published | ||||
Access rights to Published version: | Restricted or Subscription Access | ||||
Funder: | British Council | ||||
Grant number: | 788 (BC) |
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