| dc.description.abstract | The purpose of this study was to carry out a statistical analysis of the trend of diarrheal diseases in children under five years in Mulago National Referral Hospital, Kampala Uganda from 2015 to 2018. The objectives of the study were to find out the trend of diarrheal diseases in children under five years by age, to establish the effect of diarrhea on mortality in children under five years and to determine the direction of the relationship between mortality and diarrheal diseases in children under five years by gender.
The study used secondary data from Mulago Hospital in its analysis and descriptive modes of analysis were used majorly quantitative methods of data analysis to capture data. The study findings on the stationarity of the data of diarrheal disease prevalence revealed that since the computed T statistic (3.4935) in absolute terms was greater than the critical value (2.595170) in absolute terms (P value =0.000), we rejected the null hypothesis and concluded with the alternative that the diarrhea prevalence figures are stationary implying that the diarrhea prevalence figures were evolving around the mean value. The study also found out that there is a decline in the prevalence of diarrhea among children under five years from 17.3 %( 945) to 15.7 % (855) in 2018. The reasons for the decline included introduction of rotavirus vaccine and improvement in water supply. Similarly, the findings on the effect of diarrheal diseases on the mortality rate and gender of the children as revealed in the regression table showed that the coefficient of gender of the children affected by diarrhea (-0.304611) implies that diarrheal diseases depend on the gender of the child.
It is recommended that the Ministry of Health in conjunction with Uganda Health Service and other health organizations both local and international organizations should intensity the sensitization and encourage communities to take their children for rotavirus vaccination which was newly introduced in 2018.The government should give financial support to the health facilities providing vaccines and medicine to children with diarrheal disease so that they can provide these services at a relatively cheaper price. The Government through the Ministry of Health should organize seminars and workshops at health center II, III and IV across the country to sensitize people on the dangers of diarrhea to children of age below five years .The Government should also put advertisements on the different media among which include Televisions, Radio stations and in Newspapers talking about the dangers of the diarrheal disease. | en_US |
