Factores asociados a la desnutrición crónica infantil en Ecuador. Estudio basado en modelos de regresión y árboles de clasificación.

Abstract

This research seeks to determine significantly inf luencing factors on chronic malnutrition of children from zero to five years old in Ecuador. The variables that were part of the study have been considered according to the conceptual framework proposed by UNICEF and extracted from the databases of the latest 2018 Health and Nutrition survey developed by the National Institute of Statistics and Censuses and the Ministry of Public Health. In order to compare results, models based on classification trees and logistic regression were applied. It was found that the basic factors related to: child 's ethnic group, mother's schooling, access to mobile communication, parents' marital status, mother's age, the number of children in the family, and the type of fuel used for cooking have a significant inf luence on the infant's nutritional status. These factors are directly related with basic and underlying factors such as control of the mother before and after delivery, infant vaccination, adequate nutrition and the size of the child at birth, which also inf luence in malnutrition.