Causes of Morbidity and Mortality among Neonates and Children in Post-Conflict Burundi: A Cross-Sectional Retrospective Study.

Imelda Moise

doi:10.3390/children5090125

Abstract

The risk of a child dying before age five in Burundi is almost 1.6 times higher than that in the World Health Organization (WHO) African region. However, variations in the all-cause mortality rates across Burundi have not yet been measured directly at subnational levels, age group and by gender. The objective of this study was to describe the main causes of hospitalization and mortality in children during the neonatal period and at ages 1 to 59 months, for boys and girls, and to assess the total annual (2010) burden of under-five morbidity and mortality in hospitals using hospitalization records from 21 district hospitals. We found variation in the gender and regional distribution of the five leading causes of hospitalization and death of children under five. Although the five causes accounted for 89% (468/523) of all neonatal hospitalizations, three causes accounted for 93% (10,851/11,632) of all-cause hospitalizations for children ages 1 to 59 months (malaria, lung disease, and acute diarrhea), malaria accounted for 69% (1086/1566) of all deaths at ages 1 to 59 months. In Burundi, human malarial infections continue to be the main cause of hospitalization and mortality among under-five children.

Highlights

The annual infant mortality rates in Burundi have decreased from 101.2 deaths per 1000 live births in 1996 to 80.8 deaths per 1000 live births in 2016 [1]
Despite the steady decrease in infant mortality over recent decades, the risk of a child dying before age five is still high in this East African country [11,12], almost 1.6 times higher than that in the World Health Organization (WHO) African region in 2016 (52.3 per 1000 live births)
The objectives of this study were to describe the main causes of hospitalization and mortality in children during the neonatal period between 1 to 59 months, for boys and girls, in hospitals using data from 21 district hospitals

Summary

Introduction

The annual infant mortality rates in Burundi have decreased from 101.2 deaths per 1000 live births in 1996 to 80.8 deaths per 1000 live births in 2016 [1]. This decrease in mortality reflects specific government initiatives and policies such as performance-based financing, first implemented in 2006 as a pilot program in three provinces and scaled up in 2010 [2] to increase deliveries in health facilities and improve the quality of antenatal care [3,4,5,6]. In some hospitals in Burundi, the neonatal mortality rate is two times higher than the national average of 4.2% [13]

Objectives

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Results

Discussion

Conclusion