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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Public Health
Sec. Infectious Diseases: Epidemiology and Prevention
Volume 12 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2024.1417638

Predictors of delayed health seeking for febrile children: multilevel analysis of cross-sectional study data from Southern Ethiopia INDIVIDUAL AND CONTEXTUAL LEVEL FACTORS CONTRIBUTING TO DELAYED TREATMENT SEEKING FOR FEBRILE CHILDREN UNDER THE AGE OF FIVE IN GAMO ZONE, 2022

Provisionally accepted
Yilma Chisha Yilma Chisha 1*Tesfaye Feleke Tesfaye Feleke 1Eshetu Andarge Zeleke Eshetu Andarge Zeleke 1Zeleke Aschalewu Zeleke Aschalewu 1Zeleke Abate Zeleke Abate 1Yosef Haile Yosef Haile 1Mulugeta Dalbo Mulugeta Dalbo 2Misganu Endriyas Misganu Endriyas 3
  • 1 College of Medicine and Health Sciences, Arba Minch University, Arba Minch, Ethiopia
  • 2 Arba Minch Health Science College, Arba Minch Ethiopia, Arba Minch, Ethiopia
  • 3 South Ethiopia Regional State Health Bureaus, Jinka Ethiopia, Jinka, Ethiopia

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Background: Fever is a nonspecific response to various infectious and non-infectious triggers.Febrile illnesses are commonly reported as a primary reason for seeking health care in sub-Saharan Africa. According to WHO, delayed care is a care sought by care providers after 24 hours of fever onset. Timely diagnosis and getting prompt treatment within 24 hours of fever onset is crucial to avert risk of developing severe complications and death due to febrile illness. Understanding factors contributing to delayed health seeking is important for public health interventions. Hence, the aim of this study was Objective: To to assess individual and contextual level factors associated with the delay in seeking prompt treatment for children with fever. in Gamo zone, from September 2022 to June 2023).Method: Community based cross-sectional study was conducted from September 2022 to June 2023 in Gamo zone, Southern Ethiopia. Three districts and from each district, six clusters or Kebele were chosen again by simple random sampling. A total of 820 care givers were randomly selected. A tTwo-level mixed-effects logistic regression model was employed to identify factors associated with the delay in seeking prompt treatment. Associations were measured by adjusted odds ratio and statistical significance was declared at 5% level of significance.The prevalence of delay to in seeking prompt care was 47.8%. Factors contributing for the delay wereare: care givers age 30 years and above (AOR 0.23,:

    Keywords: delay treatment seeking, Gamo Zone, Ethiopia, Under five children, multi-level, Prompt treatment seeking

    Received: 15 Apr 2024; Accepted: 12 Aug 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Chisha, Feleke, Zeleke, Aschalewu, Abate, Haile, Dalbo and Endriyas. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Yilma Chisha, College of Medicine and Health Sciences, Arba Minch University, Arba Minch, Ethiopia

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