riycf

Utilities for Calculating Infant and Young Child Feeding Indicators

https://github.com/nutriverse/riycf

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Utilities for Calculating Infant and Young Child Feeding Indicators

README.Rmd

---
output: github_document
---



```{r, include = FALSE}
knitr::opts_chunk$set(
  collapse = TRUE,
  comment = "#>",
  fig.path = "man/figures/README-",
  out.width = "100%"
)
```


# riycf: Utilities for Calculating Infant and Young Child Feeding Indicators  


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## What are the IYCF Indicators? 

The first 1,000 days of life (from pregnancy to a child’s 2nd birthday) are critical for addressing childhood malnutrition, especially stunting. Infant and young child feeding practices (IYCF) largely overlap with this period as they cover breastfeeding and complementary feeding practices for the first two years of a child’s life. They also have a significant impact on childhood health, nutrition outcomes, and child survival. It is, therefore, critical for countries to measure IYCF practices as part of their efforts to monitor their progress toward Sustainable Development Goal 2. It is also important for development agencies to be able to monitor and evaluate their programs aimed at improving infant and young child feeding practices towards improved overall childhood nutrition.

WHO and UNICEF released the first IYCF indicators definition and measurement guidelines in 2008. In 2021, these guidelines were updated along with a revised standard questionnaire to capture the information required to calculate the updated IYCF indicators since the first initial publication. In general, the IYCF indicators can be categorized into three main categories: *(1) breastfeeding indicators*, *(2) complementary indicators*, and *(3) other indicators*.


## Why the {riycf} package?

Although the initial measurement guidelines were published in 2008 with many humanitarian organisations and country health ministries implementing these indicators, no comprehensive statistical programming package to calculate these indicators is yet available. Therefore, every time the researchers (or humanitarian organisations) are required to collect and analyse, they need a considerable amount of time to recode all the syntax (depending on which statistical program they are using). That is time-consuming work. 

This `{riycf}` package aims to address that technical gap by providing an easy-to-use package of functions to calculate all IYCF indicators provided in the [WHO guidelines](https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240018389). This include comprehensive guidelines for step-by-step usage of each automated function to analyse individual IYCF indicators using R.


## Installation 

The `{riycf}` package is not yet available on [CRAN](https://cran.r-project.org) but can be installed via the [nutriverse R Universe](https://nutriverse.r-universe.dev):

```{r r-universe-install, eval = FALSE}
install.packages(
  "riycf",
  repos = c('https://nutriverse.r-universe.dev', 'https://cloud.r-project.org')
)
```

Current development version of `{riycf}` can also be installed using the `{pak}` package as follows:

```{r pak-install, eval = FALSE}
if (require("pak")) install.packages("pak")
pak::pak("nutriverse/riycf")
```


## How does the package work?

Based on the WHO guideline’s indicator definition, the `{riycf}` package functions will calculate all the IYCF indicators. Each `{riycf}` function will perform the following tasks.

### (Beneficial in) Data cleaning
 
Each IYCF package function will perform the data quality check to ensure all the required data (variables) were correctly constructed in the dataset. For example, the minimum meal frequency indicator analysis requires the following variables for data analysis: child age, breastfeeding status, and frequency of child feeding on the previous day. The child age and child meal frequency data should be present in the `numeric - integer` format, and the breastfeeding status should be coded as a binary true/false variable with yes = 1 and no = 0. The `{riycf}` package function will ensure that integer variables are actually integers and variables that need to be recoded into numeric scores are recoded accordingly.
 
### IYCF indicator generation
 
The indicator calculation process would continue if there were no issues with the data entry. The new IYCF indicator variables will be generated based on which indicators the user asks to calculate. For example, suppose the user wanted to calculate whether the beneficiaries meet the minimum meal frequency. In this case, the user can use the `get_mmf()` functions to create a new dichotomous variable that indicates whether each child met the minimum meal frequency. More sample codes from this package were present in each function documentation.


## Data collection with computer-assisted personal interviews (CAPI)  

This package also provides the already programmed IYCF Questionnaires (based on WHO sample IYCF questionnaires) in XLS programming format. Detailed guidelines for accessing those forms are provided in the vignette article called "WHO IYCF Questionnaire XLS Forms." The different types of XLS programmed IYCF questionnaires can download on [this GitHub page](https://github.com/nicholustintzaw/iycf_xls_forms). 

## Citation

If you use `{riycf}` in your work, please cite using the suggested citation provided by a call to the `citation` function as follows:

```{r cite}
citation("riycf")
```

## Community guidelines

Feedback, bug reports, and feature requests are welcome; file issues or seek support [here](https://github.com/nutriverse/riycf/issues). If you would like to contribute to the package, please see our [contributing guidelines](https://nutriverse.io/riycf/CONTRIBUTING.html).

This project is released with a [Contributor Code of Conduct](https://nutriverse.io/riycf/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.html). By contributing to this project, you agree to abide by its terms.

Owner

Citation (CITATION.cff)

# --------------------------------------------
# CITATION file created with {cffr} R package
# See also: https://docs.ropensci.org/cffr/
# --------------------------------------------
 
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license: GPL-3.0-or-later
title: 'riycf: Utilities for Calculating Infant and Young Child Feeding Indicators'
version: 0.1.0.9000
identifiers:
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abstract: 'This package aims to generate updated indicators to assess infant and young
  child feeding (IYCF) practices at the individual under 2 years old children level.
  The indicators were developed using the technical guideline from the Indicators
  for assessing infant and young child feeding practices: definitions and measurement
  methods <https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240018389>.'
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