Abstract
Background: Pneumonia remains one of the main causes of childhood mortality despite the availability of
simple, safe, effective and inexpensive interventions to curb its mortality. This could result from sub-optimal
care seeking practices and child rearing, supplemented by lack of access to healthcare.We conducted a
studyto identify the association of malnutrition and initiation of breastfeeding variables with severe pneumonia and pneumonia/no pneumonia
Objective: To determine association of malnutrition and colostrums intake among children aged 2-24
months admitted in tertiary care hospital for severe pneumonia.
Methods: A total of 288 patients with severe pneumonia were included in this case-control study. Patients
were divided into 2 groups with 144 patients in each group selected through non-probability consecutive
sampling. Sample size was calculated using WHO sample size calculator keeping power of test at 80%, P1=
1% and P2=7.8%. Data was analyzed through SPSS version 19 and p-value < 0.05 considered as significant.
Association between study variables and severe pneumonia was computed using Chi Square Test.
Results: Mean age for group A (67 males and 77 females) was 13.00±6.40 months and group B (78 males, 66
females) 12.83±6.90 months. Malnutrition was seen in 41% of group A and 17.4% of group B patients. Colostrum intake (Initiation of breast feeding with 72 hours) was reported in 78.5% of group A and 79.2% of group
B. There was a significant association of malnutrition with severe pneumonia (p=0.000) whereas, no significant relation was found with colostrum intake (p=0.885).
Conclusion: Malnutrition was significantly associated with severe pneumonia. Colostrum was the most prevalent factor in both groups but the difference was insignificant.
