Abstract

MELO, Marcella Evangelista et al. Overweight and obesity of children in a brazilian elementary school: a comparison of three references. J. Hum. Growth Dev. [online]. 2016, vol.26, n.3, pp. 341-344. ISSN 0104-1282.  http://dx.doi.org/10.7322/jhgd.122817.

INTRODUCTION: In the diagnosis of overweight and obesity based on body mass index in children and adolescents, several national and international anthropometric references are recommended. However, there is a divergence in the estimated prevalence of overweight and obesity among the references OBJECTIVE: To identify the prevalence of overweight and obesity and to analyse the magnitude of agreement among the three references METHODS: A cross-sectional study with 975 students from the early grades of elementary school. The prevalence of overweight and obesity were estimated according to the criteria of the World Health Organization (WHO), the International Obesity Task Force (IOTF) and Conde and Monteiro. The Kappa weighted index was calculated to assess the agreement magnitude among the three references RESULTS: The highest prevalence of overweight and obesity was estimated by the Conde and Monteiro and WHO references, respectively. Overall, the IOTF revealed lower a magnitude of prevalence than the two other references. The agreement among the references identified by the Kappa index had a range of 0.66 to 0.94 CONCLUSION: Despite the satisfactory agreement among the three references, this research highlighted the differing magnitudes of the prevalence of overweight and obesity. This fact limits the ability to make comparisons among populations and impairs the development of overweight and obesity prevention actions

Keywords : prevalence; body mass index; anthropometry; overweight; obesity; students.

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