Nutritional status and correlation with academic performance among primary school children, northwest Ethiopia

This study aimed to determine the association between nutritional status and academic performance among primary school children in Debre Markos Town, northwest Ethiopia, 2017. The prevalence of stunting, underweight and wasting were 27.5% (95% CI 23.2–31.9%), 20.4% (95% CI 16.5–24.3%) and 8.7% (95% CI 6.2–11.5%), correspondingly. The low level of educational performance was significantly higher (p < 0.05) among the stunted, underweight and wasted children than that of the normal children. In multivariable logistic regression, age of the child (Adjusted Odds Ratio (AOR) = 0.177, 95% CI 0.07, 0.4), monthly income less < 1000.00 birr (AOR = 0.05, 95% Cl 0.02, 0.15), stunted children (AOR = 0.21, 95% CI 0.10, 0.43) and under-weight (AOR = 0.63, 95% CI 0.26, 0.84) were associated with academic performance. This study revealed that indicators of undernutrition were prevalent among school-age children. Thus, collaboration between the health and education sectors is required to alleviate the problem.