Abstract

SILVA, Márcia Cristina Pires da; RAMOS, Cecília Helena Bicalho  and  COSTA, Roberto Fernandes da. Nutritional status and blood pressure level of adolescents of Cubatão city, SP - Brazil. Rev. bras. crescimento desenvolv. hum. [online]. 2008, vol.18, n.3, pp. 288-297. ISSN 0104-1282.

The increase in obesity prevalence in adolescents has been contributing to earlier hypertension. OBJECTIVE: To verify nutritional status and blood pressure levels in adolescents, and the relationship among these factors. METHODS: Descriptive cross sectional study conducted in two public schools at Cubatão city, Brazil. 704 adolescents between 10 and 15 years old, 333 boys and 371 girls participated in this study. Nutritional status assessment was taken by body mass index for age and gender. Blood pressure was measured by auscultation technique, and the values obtained were assessed in accordance to height and gender percentile of the adolescents. Statistical analysis was made by proportion of subjects with overweight or obesity, and with blood pressure alterations. Chi-square test was used to verify proportion differences of blood pressure alterations between normal weight and overweight subjects, as well as Odds Ratio and 95% CI. It was adopted statistic significance to p < 0.05. RESULTS: Nutritional status assessment showed that 13.64% of adolescents were overweight and 10.37% were obese. About blood pressure alterations, 12.65% of adolescents presented High Normal blood pressure and 9.52% Hypertension. Overweight adolescents presented significantly high proportion of blood pressure alterations: X² = 15.39 (p = 0.00008); OR = 2.23 (CI% = 1.47 - 3.37). CONCLUSION: The results showed high proportion of overweight and blood pressure alterations, and relation among these variables.

Keywords : Hypertension; overweight; obesity; adolescents; nutritional status; schoolchildren.

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