Nasagre Ebenezer, Dugle Gordon, Bawontuo Vitalis
Department of Health Services Management and Administration, School of Business, Simon Diedong Dombo University of Business and Integrated Development Studies, Wa, Upper West Region, Ghana.
School of Business, Simon Diedong Dombo University of Business and Integrated Development Studies, Wa, Upper West Region, Ghana
BMJ Open. 2025 Sep 15;15(9):e101795. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2025-101795.
Child malnutrition remains a pressing public health challenge in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), where approximately 148 million children are stunted and 45 million are wasted. Although often conceptualised as a persistent condition, evidence indicates that malnutrition among children under 5 years frequently follows seasonal patterns shaped by agricultural cycles, climatic variability and socioeconomic conditions. Current interventions have paid limited attention to the food system dynamics that underpin these fluctuations. Adopting a system perspective, this scoping review will synthesise existing evidence on the food system determinants of seasonal malnutrition in children under 5 years in SSA.
The review will be conducted in accordance with the Joanna Briggs Institute methodological framework for scoping reviews and reported following Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses - Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) guidelines. A comprehensive search will be undertaken across electronic databases (Google Scholar, ProQuest Central, PubMed, Scopus and African Index Medicus) for literature published from 2015 onwards. Grey literature will also be sought from institutional repositories of the WHO, United Nations Children's Fund, Food and Agriculture Organization and World Food Programme. Screening of titles, abstracts and full texts will be performed independently by two reviewers using predefined eligibility criteria. Data extraction will capture study characteristics and food system determinants of seasonal malnutrition at micro, meso and macro levels. The Food Insecurity and Vulnerability Information and Mapping Systems framework will guide the analysis and synthesis.
As this review involves analysis of previously published data, ethical approval is not required. Findings will be disseminated through a peer-reviewed publication and social media engagements. Results will inform the development of integrated system-based approaches to address seasonal malnutrition in children under five in SSA. The full study protocol, datasets and supplementary forms will be published in an open-access repository in compliance with the Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability and Reuse principles.
This scoping review protocol is registered with the Open Science Framework (https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/RU4ZX).
儿童营养不良仍是撒哈拉以南非洲地区（SSA）紧迫的公共卫生挑战，该地区约有1.48亿儿童发育迟缓，4500万儿童消瘦。尽管儿童营养不良常被视为一种持续存在的状况，但有证据表明，5岁以下儿童的营养不良往往呈现出受农业周期、气候多变性和社会经济条件影响的季节性模式。当前的干预措施对支撑这些波动的粮食系统动态关注有限。本综述采用系统视角，将综合关于SSA地区5岁以下儿童季节性营养不良的粮食系统决定因素的现有证据。
本综述将按照乔安娜·布里格斯研究所的范围综述方法框架进行，并根据系统评价与Meta分析扩展版的首选报告项目（PRISMA-ScR）指南进行报告。将对电子数据库（谷歌学术、ProQuest Central、PubMed、Scopus和非洲医学索引）进行全面检索，以查找2015年以来发表的文献。还将从世界卫生组织、联合国儿童基金会、粮食及农业组织和世界粮食计划署的机构知识库中查找灰色文献。两名评审员将使用预定义的纳入标准独立筛选标题、摘要和全文。数据提取将获取微观、中观和宏观层面季节性营养不良的研究特征和粮食系统决定因素。粮食不安全和脆弱性信息与绘图系统框架将指导分析和综合。
由于本综述涉及对先前发表数据的分析，无需伦理批准。研究结果将通过同行评审出版物和社交媒体参与进行传播。研究结果将为制定基于系统的综合方法提供参考，以解决SSA地区5岁以下儿童的季节性营养不良问题。完整的研究方案、数据集和补充表格将根据可查找性、可访问性、互操作性和重用性原则发表在开放获取知识库中。
本范围综述方案已在开放科学框架（https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/RU4ZX）注册。
