'No weight for height' case detection strategies for therapeutic feeding programs: sensitivity to acute malnutrition and target composition based on representative surveys in humanitarian settings

Autor: Elise Lesieur, Alexia Couture, Benjamin Guesdon, Oleg O. Bilukha
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2021
Předmět:
Zdroj: BMC Nutrition, Vol 7, Iss 1, Pp 1-15 (2021)
BMC Nutrition
ISSN: 2055-0928
Popis: Background One newly proposed approach to determining eligibility of children aged 6–59 months for therapeutic feeding programs (TFPs) is to use mid-upper arm circumference (MUAC) Methods We analyzed data from 558 population representative cross-sectional cluster surveys conducted since 2007. We retrieved all children classified as severe acute malnutrition (SAM), moderate acute malnutrition (MAM), and those who are both wasted and stunted (WA + ST), and calculated proportions of previously eligible children who would now be excluded from treatment, as well as proportions of non-malnourished children among those who would become eligible. We also analyzed the expected changes in the number and demographics (sex, age) of the selected populations of children according to the different admission approaches. Results Both MUAC+SWAZ and Expanded MUAC case detection approaches substantially increase the sensitivity in detecting SAM, as compared to an approach which restricts detection of SAM cases to MUAC Conclusions These results suggest that recently promoted approaches to case detection inflate TFPs’ targets through the allocation of treatment to large numbers of children who have not been shown to require this type of support, including a significant proportion of non-acutely malnourished children in the MUAC+SWAZ approach. Considering the scarcity of resources for the implementation of TFPs, the rationale of abandoning the use of WHZ and of these alternative case detection strategies need to be critically reviewed.
Databáze: OpenAIRE
Externí odkaz: