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- Salazar, Mariano, 1976-, et al.
(author)
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Intimate partner violence and early child growth : a community-based cohort study in Nicaragua
- 2012
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In: BMC Pediatrics. - : BioMed Central. - 1471-2431 .- 1471-2431. ; 12
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Background: This study analyses whether a mother's exposure to different forms of Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) during pregnancy was associated with the index child linear growth, and whether these associations were modified by the gender of the child.Methods: A pregnancy cohort of 478 women in Leon, Nicaragua, resulted in 461 live births. From this group, 81% (375/461) children were available for anthropometric follow-up at 40 to 46 months. Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was used to assess the association between IPV and height-for-age Z-scores, adjusting for confounding factors.Results: Sixty-three percent (236/375) of the mothers had been exposed to some form of IPV during pregnancy (emotional, physical, sexual or controlling behavior). After adjustment for confounding factors, maternal exposure to any IPV during pregnancy was associated with 0.24 lower mean height-for-age Z-scores (p = 0.02). A separate analysis of each IPV type showed that emotional, physical or sexual IPV during pregnancy were not significantly associated with lower mean height-for-age Z-scores, whereas ever exposure to controlling behavior by the father of the child was related to 0.29 lower mean height-for-age Z-scores (p < 0.01) When stratified by gender, these associations remained significant only for young girls.Conclusions: This study has contributed to the growing amount of evidence pointing to the pervasive effect of different forms of IPV on child health. Our study highlights the relevance of maternal autonomy for linear child growth, especially for young girls in the Nicaraguan context.
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| 2. |
- Perez, Wilton, 1979-, et al.
(author)
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Progress towards millennium development goal 1 in northern rural Nicaragua : Findings from a health and demographic surveillance site
- 2012
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In: International Journal for Equity in Health. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1475-9276. ; 11:1
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- BACKGROUND:Millennium Development Goal 1 encourages local initiatives for the eradication of extreme poverty. However, monitoring is indispensable to insure that actions performed at higher policy levels attain success. Poverty in rural areas in low- and middle-income countries remains chronic. Nevertheless, a rural area (Cuatro Santos) in northern Nicaragua has made substantial progress toward poverty eradication by 2015. We examined the level of poverty there and described interventions aimed at reducing it.METHODS:Household data collected from a Health and Demographic Surveillance System was used to analyze poverty and the transition out of it, as well as background information on family members. In the follow-up, information about specific interventions (i.e., installation of piped drinking water, latrines, access to microcredit, home gardening, and technical education) linked them to the demographic data. A propensity score was used to measure the association between the interventions and the resulting transition from poverty.RESULTS: Between 2004 and 2009, poverty was reduced as a number of interventions increased. Although microcredit was inequitably distributed across the population, combined with home gardening and technical training, it resulted in significant poverty reduction in this rural area.CONCLUSIONS:Sustainable interventions reduced poverty in the rural areas studied by about one- third.
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