Influence of Socio-Demographic and Clinical Variables on the Frequency of Acute Respiratory Infections among Under-five Children Venunathan Abhilash1, Philip Bijoy2, Muthugounder Kandasamy3, Ismail Reetha4, Prakasam Prathima3 1Lecturer, College of Nursing, Gulf Medical University, Ajman, UAE 2Staff Nurse, Stockport NHS Foundation Trust Hospital, Manchester, UK 3Assistant Professor, College of Nursing, Gulf Medical University, Ajman, UAE 4Professor, College of Nursing, Gulf Medical University, Ajman, UAE Online published on 13 November, 2019. Abstract Background Acute Respiratory Infection (ARI) is a major cause of morbidity and mortality among young children. They account for nearly 3.9 million deaths every year globally. ARI accounts for 30–40% of the hospital outpatient visits by children under five years of age. About 156 million new episodes of childhood clinical pneumonia occurred globally in 2000, more than 95% of them in developing countries. Of all the pneumonia cases occurring in those countries, 8.7% are severe enough to be life-threatening and require hospital admission. Various risk factors have been identified across the globe such as low birth weight, lack of exclusive breastfeeding, crowding-more than seven persons per household, exposure to indoor air pollution, incomplete immunization, under-nutrition, and HIV infection. Objective Method A cross sectional study was conducted among 400 under-five children admitted in various hospitals of northern part of Kerala, South India from January 2016-December 2016. Socio-demographic and clinical data was collected by using a Socio-Demographic and Clinical Variable Portfolio. One year follow up was done to identify the frequency of acute respiratory infections among the study participants. Results A significant association (p<0.05) was found between frequency of Acute Respiratory Infections (ARI) and age of children, domicile, method of waste disposal, smoking habits of parents, birth weight and nutrional status. Top Keywords Socio-Demographic and Clinical Variables, Acute Respiratory Infections, Under-five children. Top |