Stunting is a major public health problem globally. Therefore, the aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of stunting and its associated factors among children age 6-59 months in Debre Tabor town, Northwest Ethiopia.
The overall prevalence of stunting in this study was 46% (95%CI; 41.9, 50.3), which is in line with a cross-sectional study conducted in Labella Town, Ethiopia 47.3% [18],Wukro town, Tigray region, Ethiopia 49.2% [19], Arba Minch Health and Demographic Surveillance Site (HDSS), Ethiopia 47.9% [20], Pastoral Communities of Afar Regional State, Ethiopia 43.1%[21], Amhara regional state, Ethiopia 46.3% [22] and Bule Hora, Ethiopia 47.6% [23].
However, the finding in this study is higher than the national average reported by EDHS 2016 38% [5] and other studies conducted at West Gojjam, Ethiopia 24.9% [24], Aykel town, Northwest Ethiopia 28.4% [25], SodoZuria District, South Ethiopia 24.9% [26], Evidence from 2016 Demographic and Health Survey, Ethiopia 38.3% [27], Bishoftu Town, Oromia Region, Ethiopia 16.1% [28], Damot Gale district, Southern Ethiopia 41.7% [29].
This might be due to dietary diversity differences in different areas of Ethiopia. Ethiopia is a multicultural country, which had different child feeding cultures [30, 31]
The result in our study is also higher than study conducted in Zambia 40% [32], Nigeria 38.7% [33], Southwestern Nigeria 18.6% [8], Thailand 28.8% [34], and china 8.4% [35]. This might be directly related to the difference in the economic status of the countries.
The underline cause of stunting in children is poverty and lack of educations. Therefore, children lived-in low-income countries like Ethiopia lead to the inadequacy of foods, there is also a problem with the preparations of clean and diversified foods, which directly may cause stunting [36].
On the other hand, the prevalence of stunting in this study was lower than the study done in Belesa, Ethiopia 57.7% [37], and Kayin State, Myanmar 59.4% [36]. The higher result observed in Belesa might be due to the fact that the Belesa district is mostly affected by drought, and the study was conducted among rural households [38, 39].
The odds of having stunting among children with the age group of 12-23 months were nearly 2 times higher as compared to children with age groups of 6-11 months age (AOR=1.98; 95%CI: 1.08,3.67), which is supported by a study conducted in Labella Town, Ethiopia [18], Damot Gale district, southern Ethiopia 41.7% [29], SodoZuria District, South Ethiopia 24.9% [26] and Zambia [32].
This is due to the fact that, in most studies, breastfeeding is universal in Ethiopia, and mostly it continues up to 1 year of age. As we all now breastfeeding greatly reduces the occurrence of stunting. Therefore, after one year of age when most children cease breastfeeding, they might be exposed to stunting.
The other possible explanation might be, in most cases, children are exposed to family food at the age of one to two years. This might again expose the child to stunting [32]. Researchers suggested that children accumulate growth delay during the first 2 years of life with stunting peaking around 2 and 3 years after which they stabilize [40].
The odds of having stunting among children who had a daily laborer father were 5 (AOR= 5.03; 95%CI: 2.45,10.36) times and children with a father who works in private organizations were 2.4 (AOR=2.36; 95%CI: 1.29, 4.33) times higher as compared with children whose fathers were governmental employees respectively. This might be related to the family income and feeding status of the children, children with government employee fathers would have better income as compared to their counterparts.
The odds of having stunting among children who had a father with no formal education were nearly 3 (AOR=2.88; 95%CI: (1.45-5.70) times and children with fathers who attend primary school were 2 (AOR=1.98; 95%CI: (1.03-3.79) times higher as compared to children with fathers who attended high school and above educational level respectively.
This is supported by a study conducted at West Gojjam, Ethiopia 24.9% [24].
The possible reason might be educated fathers had better awareness regarding the kinds and amounts of food appropriate for their children. As the level of education increase, the knowledge of fathers towards child feeding practices, common childhood disorders, child nutritional problems will increase, therefore, stunting will be decreased.
The odds of having stunting among children who had housewife mothers were 2 times higher than children of their mothers who were a governmental employee (AOR=2.13; 95%CI: 1.16, 3.92). This might be due to related to the income and educational level of the mothers. If the mothers were employed, they should have formal education which implies they will have better awareness regarding child feeding practice. On the other hand, if the mothers were employed, they will have a good income as compared to housewife mothers.
Limitation of the study
Even though we tried to minimize, there might be a sort of recall bias. Since the study is on an interview base. Furthermore, the study is cross-sectional it does not show a cause-effect relationship between out-come and associated factors