Table 1 Variables recoding procedures of Malaria Indicator Survey datasets

Level one variables (individual level variables)

 Number of children under 5

v137

One

Recoded as 1 = "one", 2 = "two", 3 = "three ", 4 = "four", 5 = "five or above"

Two

Three

Four

Five or above

 Age of the child (in years)

hw1

One year old

Recoded as 1 = “min/12 months”, 2 = “13/24 months”, 3 = “25/36 months”, 4 = “37/48 months”, and 5 = ”49/60 months”

Two years old

Three years old

Four years old

Five years old

 Sex of the child

b4

Male

Recoded as 1 = ” male” and 2 = “female”

female

 Wealth index

v190

Poorest

Recoded as 1 = “poorest”, 2 = “poorer”, 3 = “middle”, 4 = “richer” and 5 = “richest”

Poorer

Middle

Richer

Richest

 Had fever in last two weeks

h22

Yes

Recoded as

1 = “Yes”

0 = “No”

No

 Had malaria

S406

Yes

Recoded as

1 = “Yes”

0 = “No”

No

 Mother’s highest level of education

v106

No education

Recoded as 0 = “no education”, 1 = “primary”, 2 = “secondary”, and 3 = “Higher”

Primary

Secondary

Higher

No education

Yes

Level two variables (community variables)

 Type of place of residence

v025

Urban

Recoded as

1 = “Urban”

2 = “Rural”

Rural

 Country code

v000

This cell needs a hand

Dependent variables

 Anti-malarial taken for malaria

This was deducted by code from the dataset

Yes

Recoded as

1 = “Yes”

0 = “No”

No

Random effect variables

 Sampling weight

v005

For weighting the observation

 Primary sampling unit (PSU)

v021

For sample selection

 Strata

v022

For stratification