ఇంటర్నేషనల్ జర్నల్ ఆఫ్ ఎమర్జెన్సీ మెంటల్ హెల్త్ అండ్ హ్యూమన్ రెసిలెన్స్

నైరూప్య

Comparison of depression among married and divorced people in Ethiopia: Meta-analysis and systematic review

Abiyu Ayalew Assefa, Kaleab Tesfaye Tegegne, Gashaw Mehiret Wubet, Geleta Abera, Andualem Zenebe

Background: At a global level, over 300 million people were estimated to suffer from depression in 2015, which was equivalent to 4.4% of the world’s population. In Ethiopia, mental illness in particular depression is the leading non-communicable disorder in terms of burden. Depression has an impact on productivity, motivation to work, sleep behavior of the individual, and outcome of different chronic diseases. It is known that in order to set different prevention strategy providing reliable and up-to-date evidence on depression is very essential. Therefore, the purpose of this review is to provide latest available comparison of depression among married and divorced people in Ethiopia. Methods: This is systemic review and meta-analysis by study design. We systematically searched the databases: Google Scholar, Medline and Web of science database for studies conducted in Ethiopia on the availability of depression since 2010. The assessment of included studies were done using checklist developed by Joanna Briggs Institute which consists of eight points to screen article. Combined effect size across the studies using Mantel-Haenszel (MH) statistic (random effect model) and moderator analysis by taking prevalence of depression as fixed factor was used. The 𝐼2 statistic was used to assess variation across studies and above 50% was considered as significant. Egger’s and Begg’s tests were used to assess for publication bias. Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) guidelines protocol was used to write and compile the report. Results: We screened a total of 351 articles. From these, 20 studies were included in the final systematic review and meta-analysis. In Ethiopia, the combined effect size of all studies revealed a statistically significant association between marital status and depression (pooled OR = 0.57; 95% CI: 0.37–0.86). Conclusions: We found that divorced people were more likely to have depression than married people. Thus, more attention should be paid to strengthen activities which discourage divorce at community level and integrating mental health counseling into health extension programme is advisable.