Community-based Therapeutic Care (CTC): A Field Manual

This manual reflects the experience gained over five years of implementing and developing Community-based therapeutic Care (CTC). It is a practical guide that aims to help health and nutrition managers to design, implement and evaluate CTC programmes.

CTC is an evolving model. This manual should therefore be considered as dynamic. It will be periodically revised and updated. In recognition of the context-specific nature of CTC, this manual is not intended as a 'cookbook', whereby the reader follows a recipe and achieves the desired result. Rather, it is meant to be a tool to enable the reader to ask the right questions and determine the processes that will form the building blocks of effective programming.

CTC experience to date has been primarily with children aged six months to five years. Therefore this manual principally refers to the management of children in this age group and refers to child/children throughout the text. Guidelines for other groups are not included. This does not imply that other groups in the population such as adolescents, adults and the elderly cannot be treated using CTC protocols. However, this will require a modification of the protocols.