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Khouma, Marietou, Diallo, Mamadou, Sow, Doudou, Djigal, Aicha, Diop, Ndeye Sokhna, Allen, Stephen 
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6675-249X and Faye, Babacar
(2025)
'Efficacy of prebiotic, probiotic and synbiotic administration in improving growth in children aged 0–59 months living in low and
middle‑income countries: a systematic review and meta‑analysis.'. BMC Pediatrics, Vol 25, e149.
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Abstract
Background
Poor growth is one of the major obstacles to human development, affecting millions of children under the age of 5 years, particularly those living in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The objective of this review was to evaluate the efficacy of administering pre-, pro- or synbiotics on the growth of children aged 0–59 months living in LMICs.
Methods
Google scholar, Pubmed, clinical trial.org and Science Direct databases were searched in April 2023 for randomised controlled trials of pre-, pro- or synbiotics that evaluated growth in under fives in LMICs. The primary outcome were weight and height gain. Secondary outcomes were head circumference, body mass index gain and Z
score. Random-effects meta-analysis was used to calculate mean differences for continuous outcomes. Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation criteria was used to assess certainty of the evidence.
Results
Eight trials involving 1375 children under 5 years of age were identified. Meta-analysis of 6 RCTs (n = 991 children) revealed a significant difference in favor of the experimental group (n = 579) compared the control group (n = 412) for weight gain: (MD = 0.33 kg, 95% CI 0.11 to 0.55); low-certainty evidence. Sub-group analysis revealed that pre-, pro, or synbiotics may be more effective in malnourished that healthy children (p = 0.003). Meta-analysis
of height gain for 4 RCTs (n = 845) found that there was no significant difference between the experimental group (n = 496) and the control group (n = 349) (MD = 0.31 cm; 95% CI -0.36 to 0.98); low-certainty evidence. In sub-group analysis, prebiotics had a greater impact on height gain than synbiotics (p = 0.03). In the only study reporting
an increase in head circumference (n = 32 children), this was not improved by the administration of synbiotics. However,
administration of synbiotics to undernourished children significantly improved BMI gain.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Subjects: | WA Public Health > WA 30 Socioeconomic factors in public health (General) WS Pediatrics > Child Care. Nutrition. Physical Examination > WS 115 Nutritional requirements. Nutrition disorders |
| Faculty: Department: | Clinical Sciences & International Health > Clinical Sciences Department |
| Digital Object Identifer (DOI): | https://doi.org/10.1186/s12887-025-05503-0 |
| Depositing User: | Jane Rawlinson |
| Date Deposited: | 19 Mar 2025 12:00 |
| Last Modified: | 19 Mar 2025 12:00 |
| URI: | https://archive.lstmed.ac.uk/id/eprint/26258 |
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