Diarrhea and fever as risk factors for anemia among children under age five living in urban slum areas of Indonesia.

OBJECTIVE

To characterize diarrhea and fever as risk factors for anemia among children in developing countries.

METHODS

We characterized risk factors for anemia in a sample of 32873 children, aged 6-59 months, from poor families in urban slum areas of Indonesia from 2000 to 2003.

RESULTS

The prevalence of anemia was 58.7%. In separate multivariate models, after adjusting for age, sex, stunting, maternal age and education, and weekly per capita household expenditure, current diarrhea (OR 1.20, 95% CI 1.07-1.35, p=0.002), current fever (OR 1.44, 95% CI 1.18-1.75, p<0.0001), and a history of diarrhea in the previous seven days (OR 1.12, 95% CI 1.03-1.23, p=0.024) were associated with an increased risk of anemia.

CONCLUSIONS

Diarrhea and fever are important risk factors for anemia among young children living in urban slum communities in Indonesia.