v) Consistency over time – constant trend for the indicator

Routine data consistency over time is assessed as part of the Internal Consistency domain. It uses the mean of the three preceding years for the indicator that is compared to the indicator value of the current year.

Use of this feature for nutrition indicators should be carefully studied as countries are currently making efforts to:

• improve coverage of nutrition indicators and this can increase the mean of cases over years;
• invest to prevent and manage malnutrition events which can decrease the number of cases over years and reduce the mean;
• indicators such as wasting can quickly change over time due to shocks or improvement of the situation.
  Interpretation of this feature for nutrition indicators (e.g. stunting, wasting or overweight) should be carefully assessed.