Evaluations of the CMAM Surge Approach

Last updated:

23 November 2020

Author:

Concern Worldwide

Concern’s outreach nutrition programme reaches communities who would otherwise have no access to health care. Clinics are held wherever possible, here under the shade of an acacia tree in Sahgel, Chalbi District in Marsabit, Kenya. Photo: Gideon Mendel.

CMAM Surge is an innovative health systems strengthening (HSS) approach that helps prepare health facilities to respond to increased demands in acute malnutrition treatment services that occur due to seasonal or unforeseen shocks and stresses. While traditional emergency responses can cause unintended damage to health systems through the creation of parallel, NGO, and cluster-driven responses, CMAM Surge is unique in that it strives to improve emergency preparedness and response through longer-term resilience-informed HSS approaches.

Since its initial design and pilot in Kenya in 2012, the CMAM Surge approach has been successfully scaled up and introduced in a variety of countries and contexts through the leadership and support of multiple governments, NGOs and donor and UN agencies. This has led to new learning and context-specific adaptations of the approach. Concern Worldwide has led and commissioned several learning reviews and evaluations, including a cost-effectiveness analysis, have been completed in order to justify and inform scale-up of the CMAM Surge approach.