Effect of Nutrition Education and Counseling Intervention on the Dietary Diversity Practice of Pregnant Women in Ethiopia: A systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Effect of Nutrition Education and Counseling Intervention on the Dietary Diversity Practice of Pregnant Women in Ethiopia: A systematic Review and Meta-analysis | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Systematic Review Effect of Nutrition Education and Counseling Intervention on the Dietary Diversity Practice of Pregnant Women in Ethiopia: A systematic Review and Meta-analysis Gizaw Sisay, Mahlet Birhan, Tsion Mulate This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-7779127/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract Background A diversified diet plays a crucial role in in determining pregnancy outcomes and the future health of the child. In Ethiopia, inadequate dietary diversity among pregnant women remains a significant public health concern, contributing to maternal undernutrition, low birth weight, and poor infant development. Nutritional education and counseling intervention during pregnancy are the best strategies to improve dietary diversity practice of the pregnant women. Objective This systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to estimating the pooled effects of nutrition education and counseling intervention on the pregnant women dietary diversity practice in Ethiopia. Methods The relevant studies searched from distinct databases such as (PubMed, African journals online, Google scholar, web of science and the institutional repository of Ethiopian universities were used. Data were extracted using Microsoft Excel, and analysis was performed using STATA-17. A random-effects model was used to estimate the overall effect size of nutritional education and counseling intervention on the dietary diversity practice of pregnant women. The pooled effect size was expressed as risk ratio (RR) with a 95% CI. \(\:{I}^{2}\)-test statistics was used for assessing heterogeneity between included studies. Egger's test and funnel plot were used for assessing publication bias. Results A total of nine peer-reviewed studies that met the inclusion criteria with a total of 3739 pregnant women were involved in this study. The pooled effect of nutritional education and counseling intervention was RR: 1.78 with 95% CI (1.44, 2.18). There was a high heterogeneity (\(\:{I}^{2}\) = 91.1%) was observed between includes studies. Conclusions Nutrition education during pregnancy have a positive effect in improving dietary diversity practice of pregnant women. Therefore, we recommend that health care providers and stakeholders offer nutrition education and counseling alongside routine services for pregnant women, ensuring they are equipped with essential knowledge about healthy dietary behaviors during pregnancy. Registered on the PROSPERO database (CRD42025106769) Nutrition education dietary diversity pregnant women meta-analysis Ethiopia Full Text Additional Declarations The authors declare no competing interests. Cite Share Download PDF Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-7779127","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Systematic Review","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":526678177,"identity":"2d741311-35f8-44a5-a45f-611a92d0aab5","order_by":0,"name":"Gizaw 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University","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":true,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":true,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"Nutrition education, dietary diversity, pregnant women, meta-analysis, Ethiopia","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-7779127/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-7779127/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBackground\u003c/strong\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA diversified diet plays a crucial role in in determining pregnancy outcomes and the future health of the child. In Ethiopia, inadequate dietary diversity among pregnant women remains a significant public health concern, contributing to maternal undernutrition, low birth weight, and poor infant development. Nutritional education and counseling intervention during pregnancy are the best strategies to improve dietary diversity practice of the pregnant women.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eObjective\u003c/strong\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to estimating the pooled effects of nutrition education and counseling intervention on the pregnant women dietary diversity practice in Ethiopia.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMethods\u003c/strong\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe relevant studies searched from distinct databases such as (PubMed, African journals online, Google scholar, web of science and the institutional repository of Ethiopian universities were used. Data were extracted using Microsoft Excel, and analysis was performed using STATA-17. A random-effects model was used to estimate the overall effect size of nutritional education and counseling intervention on the dietary diversity practice of pregnant women. The pooled effect size was expressed as risk ratio (RR) with a 95% CI. \\(\\:{I}^{2}\\)-test statistics was used for assessing heterogeneity between included studies. Egger's test and funnel plot were used for assessing publication bias.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eResults\u003c/strong\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA total of nine peer-reviewed studies that met the inclusion criteria with a total of 3739 pregnant women were involved in this study. The pooled effect of nutritional education and counseling intervention was RR: 1.78 with 95% CI (1.44, 2.18). There was a high heterogeneity (\\(\\:{I}^{2}\\) = 91.1%) was observed between includes studies.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eConclusions\u003c/strong\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNutrition education during pregnancy have a positive effect in improving dietary diversity practice of pregnant women. Therefore, we recommend that health care providers and stakeholders offer nutrition education and counseling alongside routine services for pregnant women, ensuring they are equipped with essential knowledge about healthy dietary behaviors during pregnancy.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eRegistered on the PROSPERO database (CRD42025106769)\u003c/p\u003e","manuscriptTitle":"Effect of Nutrition Education and Counseling Intervention on the Dietary Diversity Practice of Pregnant Women in Ethiopia: A systematic Review and Meta-analysis","msid":"","msnumber":"","nonDraftVersions":[{"code":1,"date":"2025-10-22 08:58:38","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-7779127/v1","editorialEvents":[{"type":"communityComments","content":0}],"status":"published","journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true}}],"origin":"","ownerIdentity":"99219932-2907-4892-a6ca-142df45039fe","owner":[],"postedDate":"October 22nd, 2025","published":true,"recentEditorialEvents":[],"rejectedJournal":[],"revision":"","amendment":"","status":"posted","subjectAreas":[],"tags":[],"updatedAt":"2025-10-22T08:58:38+00:00","versionOfRecord":[],"versionCreatedAt":"2025-10-22 08:58:38","video":"","vorDoi":"","vorDoiUrl":"","workflowStages":[]},"version":"v1","identity":"rs-7779127","journalConfig":"researchsquare"},"__N_SSP":true},"page":"/article/[identity]/[[...version]]","query":{"redirect":"/article/rs-7779127","identity":"rs-7779127","version":["v1"]},"buildId":"8U1c8b4HqxoKbykW_rLl7","isFallback":false,"isExperimentalCompile":false,"dynamicIds":[84888],"gssp":true,"scriptLoader":[]}