Abstract:
BACKGROUND:
The leading causes of mortality globally in children younger than five years of age (under-fives), and particularly in the regions of subSaharan Africa (SSA) and Southern Asia, in 2018 were infectious diseases, including pneumonia (15%), diarrhoea (8%), malaria (5%) and
newborn sepsis (7%) (UNICEF 2019). Nutrition-related factors contributed to 45% of under-five deaths (UNICEF 2019).
World Health Organization (WHO) and United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), in collaboration with other development partners, have
developed an approach – now known as integrated community case management (iCCM) – to bring treatment services for children 'closer
to home'. The iCCM approach provides integrated case management services for two or more illnesses – including diarrhoea, pneumonia,
malaria, severe acute malnutrition or neonatal sepsis – among under-fives at community level (i.e. outside of healthcare facilities) by lay
health workers where there is limited access to health facility-based case management services (WHO/UNICEF 2012).
OBJECTIVES:
To assess the eHects of the integrated community case management (iCCM) strategy on coverage of appropriate treatment for childhood
illness by an appropriate provider, quality of care, case load or severity of illness at health facilities, mortality, adverse events and coverage
of careseeking for children younger than five years of age in low- and middle-income countries.
SEARCH METHODS:
We searched CENTRAL, MEDLINE, Embase and CINAHL on 7 November 2019, Virtual Health Library on 8 November 2019, and Popline on 5
December 2018, three other databases on 22 March 2019 and two trial registers on 8 November 2019. We performed reference checking,
and citation searching, and contacted study authors to identify additional studies.
