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Home » Topics » Nutrition and Anthropometry » Difference between HW5 and HC70 (Nutritional status)
Difference between HW5 and HC70 [message #28014] Thu, 02 November 2023 03:27 Go to next message
fraeus is currently offline  fraeus
Messages: 14
Registered: February 2023
Member
Hi, I do not understand the difference between HW5 and HC70. I want to calcuate stunting for children and I was using hw5. Then, I was suggested to use hc70 in the forum, but I do not understand the difference between the two. I suppose they give the same info, but I have a few hundreds of observations for hc70 than for hw5. Why? Thank you. I am using Rwanda DHS 2014
Re: Difference between HW5 and HC70 [message #28032 is a reply to message #28014] Fri, 03 November 2023 09:42 Go to previous message
Janet-DHS is currently offline  Janet-DHS
Messages: 852
Registered: April 2022
Senior Member
Following is a response from DHS staff member, Tom Pullum:

hc70, hc71, and hc72 (the basis of the HAZ, WAZ, and WHZ, respectively) are constructed from the height and weight measurements using the WHO Child Growth Standards (https://www.who.int/tools/child-growth-standards). DHS has used this standard since approximately 2006. Before then, the international standard came from CDC (the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) and was biased toward children in the U.S. The older surveys include hc5, hc9, and hc13 (for the HAZ, WAZ, and WHZ, respectively). Even after the WHO standard was adopted, DHS has continued to include the CDC standard so that users can make comparisons. However, we ONLY use the WHO standard in tables and reports, and strongly recommend that users use the WHO standard.
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