Common causes of child mortality in Sana a, Yemen

OBJECTIVE: To study the common causes of child mortality at Al-Thawrah Hospital, Sana a, Yemen.

METHODS: A retrospective study of 639 children aged 0-14 years, who died in the hospital within a 4 year period. This study was carried out at the Al-Thawrah Hospital, Sana a, Yemen, between January 2000 and December 2003. Children who were admitted to the pediatric/nursery unit and died in the hospital were included in this study. Data were collected from patient's files, hospital register and death certificate to ascertain the cause of death and their percentage.

RESULTS: Out of 4575 admissions to the pediatric unit, there were 639 children deaths (13.96%). Deaths were higher among those <2 years of age. The most common causes of deaths in the pediatric unit were infections (18.1%) followed by respiratory problems (17.7%), central nervous system diseases (12%), renal (9.7%), malignancy (9.5%), shock (7.9%) and cardiac diseases(7.3%). While in the nursery, out of 4182 admissions in the same period, 823 died (19.67%), among these were pre-maturity (47%), birth asphyxia (23.7%), infections (10.9%), congenital anomalies (8.4%), central nervous system diseases (5.3%) and others (4.7%). Postmortem examination was not carried out in any of the cases.

CONCLUSION: The percentage of deaths on admission among children is less than it was previously, but remains high. The majority of the causes of death are preventable. Efforts to further reduce the mortality should be directed at prevention and early treatment.