Prevalence of Diarrhoea Diseases among Children under five years in the Kintampo North Municipality

Abstract

About 22% of childhood deaths in developing countries are attributable to diarrhoea. Diarrhoea rates in Ghana are reported to be high, with cases estimated at 113,786 among children under-five years in 2011. This study analyzed the prevalence and trends of diarrhoea diseases in the Kintampo North Municipality of Ghana. A retrospective analysis of records on diarrhoea data for a five-year period from January 2015 to December 2019 was undertaken. A total of 36521 diarrhoea case reports extracted from District Health Information Management System (DHIMS) II database in an Excel format was exported to Stata version 14 for data cleaning, verification, and analysis. Excel version 2016 was used to plot the actual observed cases by years to assess trends and seasonality. Males had the slightly higher levels of diarrhoea incidence within the 5-year period. Overall, diarrhea incidence in this study fluctuates, with decreasing and increasing trends. There was an annual increase in diarrhoea from 2015 to 2019, except in 2017 where there was a decline in incidence was observed, followed by a sharp increase in 2018. The Kintampo North Municipality reported 31 cases of diarrhea per 1000 population among children <5 years in 2015. The incidence increased to 71 cases per 1000 population in 2016 and subsequently declined to 53 cases per 1000 population in 2017. Diarrhoea cases were found in this study to be high mostly in May and September, within the years which corresponds to the rainy season with slight deviations. Waterborne diseases increase in rainfall and decrease during drought events in harmattan season in Ghana, which confirms our study. Males are slightly more susceptible to diarrhea than females in the Kintampo District, accounting for an incidence rate of 50.9% (18596/36521) per thousand persons compared to female.