Child Health Accountability Tracking technical advisory group (CHAT)
Improving health and well-being outcomes for children (age 1 month to 59 months, and 5 to 9 years) is a priority for WHO and UNICEF. CHAT is a technical advisory group to WHO and UNICEF. Its main objective is to support the harmonization and standardization of child health and well-being indicators, across a variety of domains including education, nutrition, mental health, violence, environment, and injuries as well as communicable and noncommunicable diseases.
Improving health and well-being outcomes for children (age 1 month to 59 months, and 5 to 9 years) is a priority for WHO and UNICEF. CHAT is a technical advisory group to WHO and UNICEF. Its main objective is to support the harmonization and standardization of child health and well-being indicators.
Objectives of CHAT
Objective 1: To provide a platform for sharing and discussing the work of key child health and well-being initiatives and relevant work of UNICEF and WHO aimed at the achievement of child health related global goals and targets.
Objective 2: To identify priority activities and measurement gaps in child health and well-being.
Objective 3: To create a catalogue of standard indicators and validated tools for measuring and monitoring child health and well-being indicators.
Activities of CHAT
CHAT selected 26 core indicators measuring child health and well-being (published in Lancet Child and Adolescent Health). This group of indicators can be found in the searchable toolkit of child health indicators.
The group completed a roadmap for prioritizing a set of childhood pneumonia indicators for measurement improvement. Similar roadmaps are underway for malaria and diarrhoea.
CHAT regularly reviews papers, tools, and resources created by other groups, providing input specifically on the measurement of child health and well-being indicators. In 2020-2022 CHAT TAG reviewed and provided technical advice for the following publications:
Effective coverage measurement in maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health and nutrition: progress, future prospects, and implications for quality health systems
Lancet Glob Health 2020; 8: e730–36
A call for standardised age-disaggregated health data
The Lancet Healthy Longevity, Volume 2, Issue 7, July 2021, Pages E436-E443
Scaling up a monitoring and evaluation framework for sexual, reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health services and outcomes in humanitarian settings: A global initiative
ScienceDirect, Dialogues in health, volume 1, Dec 2022, 100075
A rapid systematic review and evidence synthesis of effective coverage measures and cascades for childbirth, newborn and child health in low- and middle-income countries
J Glob Health . 2022 Jan 15;12:04001
Global core indicators for measuring WHO’s paediatric quality-of-care standards in health facilities: development and expert consensus
BMC Health Services Research volume 22, Article number: 887 (2022)
Measurement tools and indicators for assessing nurturing care for early childhood development: A scoping review
PLOS Global Public Health 2(4) 2022 April: e0000373
Meeting reports
Peer-reviewed publications
30 October 2022
Report on the Eighth Meeting of the Child Health Accountability Tracking Technical Advisory Group (CHAT-TAG)
6 June 2022
Meeting minutes of the Seventh Meeting of the Child Health Accountability Tracking Technical Advisory Group (CHAT-TAG)
30 July 2020
Meeting minutes of the Fifth Meeting of the Child Health Accountability Tracking Technical Advisory Group (CHAT-TAG)
20 June 2020
Report on the Fourth Meeting of the Child Health Accountability Tracking Technical Advisory Group (CHAT-TAG)
20 December 2019
Report on the Third Meeting of the Child Health Accountability Tracking Technical Advisory Group (CHAT-TAG)
5 June 2019
Second Meeting of the Child Health Accountability Tracking (CHAT)Technical Advisory Group (in-person)
30 November 2018
First Meeting of the Child Health Accountability Tracking (CHAT)Technical Advisory Group
Measuring and monitoring child health and wellbeing: recommendations for tracking progress with a core set of indicators in the Sustainable Development Goals era
Lancet Child and Adolescent Health, Volume 6, May 2022, 345-352.
Revitalizing child health: lessons from the past
Global Health Action, 14:1, 1947565
Child Health Accountability Tracking—extending child health measurement
Lancet Child and Adolescent Health. 2020, S2352-4642(19)30426-2
Key links
- UNICEF’s Data site
- MCA data portal - Child data
- Global Strategy for Women’s Children’s and Adolescents Health (2016-2030) Data Portal
- Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMCI)
- Improving the quality of paediatric care: an operational guide for facility based audit and review of paediatric mortality
- Ending preventable child deaths from pneumonia and diarrhoea by 2025: The integrated Global Action Plan for Pneumonia and Diarrhoea (GAPPD)
- Nurturing Care for Early Childhood Development
- WHO Global Health Estimates
- WHO Global Health Observatory
Related WHO teams
Related health topics