Can therapeutic (outpatient and inpatient) coverage for SAM be representative of ALL coverage? If we proceed with SQUEAC for SAM only, can inferences be drawn about Supplementary Feeding Program (SFP) coverage for MAM based on the coverage figure given for therapeutic coverage?
There is no general reason to think that therapeutic service coverage will be the same as SFP. Although information pertinent to the SFP may be gained during a SQUEAC focusing on SAM coverage, an independent survey should be carried out to assess SFP coverage. CSAS, SQUEAC, SLEAC can be used for SFP coverage, but they require the use of house-to-house/door-to-door sampling. This is because the active and adaptive sampling method commonly used lacks case finding sensitivity for MAM cases (only the most severe cases of MAM tend to be detected). This means that we need to use a census type sample to find MAM cases.
Source: Guevarra E, Norris A, Guerrero S and Myatt M,
Assessment of Coverage of Community-based Management of Acute Malnutrition, CMAM Forum Technical Brief July 2012, Version 2: September 2014. Accessible online
here.