The Effect of Socioeconomic Drivers on Under-five Mortality Rates: A Survey Bayesian Meta-analysis Study

Abstract

Background Studies on approaches for combining information from related studies have been well-documented in the literature. However, limited research has been conducted to focus on the issue of combining parameter estimates in the context of under-five mortality. Objectives The objective of this study was to study the overall effect of socioeconomic factors on under-five mortality, considering the censoring problem and survey design features. Methods This study estimates the overall effect of risk factors on under-five mortality in four countries from the sub-Saharan African region using Bayesian hierarchical meta-analysis. The data used in the study is from the previous four demographics and health surveys for a research area. Results The results obtained using the Bayesian Meta Cox PH model are almost similar to those using the extended Cox except for one key finding. A child from a rural area has an increased risk of dying compared to a child from an urban area. Whereas it is insignificant when using the extended Cox model. Conclusion The study has demonstrated drivers of child mortality using Bayesian hierarchical meta-analysis.