Understanding careseeking for child illness in sub-Saharan Africa: A systematic review and conceptual framework based on qualitative research of household recognition and response to child diarrhoea, pneumonia and malaria

► Decision making is characterised by uncertainty, experimentation, and shifting interpretations of illness and treatment. ► The person who controls household finances usually gets to decide on the course of treatment. ► Who that person is often shifts during an illness as family and community networks are mobilised. ► Drug sellers, community health workers, herbalists and traditional healers were a critical 'middle layer' of providers. ► 'Waiting' is an important, conscious element of the process of household recognition and response.