Neonatal characteristics and conditions contributed to stunting: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Globally, stunting is one of the most serious and challenging public health problems in the world. It is critical to have information on how to reduce stunting. Therefore, this study aimed to identify neonatal determinants of stunting among children under five years. This meta-analysis searched for observational studies published in English from 2000 to 2022 focusing on the association between neonatal characteristics and conditions affecting the incidence of stunting in children aged 0-5 years. We searched in Google Scholar, PubMed, and other online databases. Two review authors independently selected studies for inclusion, extracted data, and assessed the risk of bias in the included studies. The pooled analysis was carried out using software review manager (RevMan) 5.3. Pooled analysis indicated that children under 5 years with anemia or whoever had diarrhea had a higher odds of becoming stunted than those who did not have anemia or not ever had diarrhea and both of these results were statistically significant. Male children had a higher odds of stunting compared to female children. Our study suggest that anemia, recently had diarrhea, and boys are risk factors of stunting