© Borgis - New Medicine 3/2014, s. 79-82
*Sylwia Merkiel, Wojciech Chalcarz
Selected indices of health status in 6-year-old children and their families from southern Poland
Food and Nutrition Department of the Eugeniusz Piasecki University School of Physical Education in Poznań, Poland
Head of the Department: prof. dr hab. Wojciech Chalcarz
Summary
Aim. The aim was to analyse selected indices of health status in 6-year-old children and their families from southern Poland.
Material and methods. The studied population comprised 120 six-year-old children, 64 girls and 56 boys, who attended the last grade in the preschools in Nowy Sącz and the vicinity. The children’s parents filled in questionnaires on selected indices of health status of the children and their families. Statistical analysis was carried out by means of the IBM SPSS Statistics 21 computer programme. The studied population was divided according to gender.
Results. Boys were characterised by statistically significantly higher birth weight than girls, 3.5 kg and 3.3 kg, respectively. Most children, 78.0%, took vitamin and mineral supplements, and substantial percentages of the children took medicines and suffered from food allergies or other allergies, 22.9%, 10.4% and 14.7%, respectively. Substantial percentages of parents informed that there were diet-related
INTRODUCTION
The needs of children, concerning both physical activity and nutrition, are great due to the children’s rapid growth and development (1-4). To satisfy these needs and provide adequate conditions for appropriate growth and development, educational programmes for parents and other caregivers should be worked out and implemented, as well as intervention programmes aimed at educating caregivers on how to teach the children healthy food habits and the habit of daily physical activity. However, to work out an effective educational strategy and a successful intervention programme, it is indispensable to know the health status of the children and their families. Health status provides important information about what special recommendations on nutrition and physical activity should be included.
AIM
The aim of this study was to analyse selected indices of health status in 6-year-old children and their families from southern Poland.
MATERIAL AND METHODS
The studied population comprised 120 six-year-old children, 64 girls and 56 boys, who attended the last grade in the preschools in Nowy Sącz and the vicinity. The preschools were associated with the Nowy Sącz League of Preschools and Schools Promoting Health. All the details on recruiting the children for the study are described in the previous article (5). The children’s parents filled in questionnaires on selected indices of health status of the children and their families. When analysing positive answers to the questions about diet-related diseases in the children’s families, the following answers were taken into account: mother, father, grandmother, grandfather, great-grandmother, great-grandfather, aunt (but only the mother’s or father’s sister) and uncle (but only the mother’s or father’s brother). The study was approved by the Bioethics Committee of the Poznań University of Medical Sciences.
Statistical analysis was carried out by means of the IBM SPSS Statistics computer programme, version 21. The studied population was divided according to gender. Means and standard deviations were calculated for children’s birth weight. This variable was also analysed using the Shapiro-Wilk statistic for testing normality. Since the variable was not normally distributed, the non-parametric Mann-Whitney U test was used to investigate statistically significant differences. The level of significance was set at p ≤ 0.05.
Qualitative variables were presented in contingency tables. Statistical significance was determined using Pearson’s chi-square test, except for the variables with more than 20% of cells with an expected frequency of less than five. In this case, the Mann-Whitney U test was used. The level of significance was set at p ≤ 0.05.
RESULTS
Table 1 shows health status of the studied 6-year-old children and their families. Boys were characterised by statistically significantly higher birth weight than girls, 3.5 kg and 3.3 kg, respectively.
Table 1. Health status of the studied 6-year-old children and their families.
| Variable | Girls
(n = 64) | Boys
(n = 56) | All children
(n = 120) |
| Birth weight (kg) | 3.3 ± 0.51* | 3.5 ± 0.41* | 3.4 ± 0.51 |
| Food allergies (%) | 9.7 | 11.3 | 10.4 |
| Other allergies (%) | 12.9 | 16.7 | 14.7 |
| Taking medicines (%) | 19.0 | 27.3 | 22.9 |
| Taking vitamin and mineral supplements (%) | 81.0 | 74.5 | 78.0 |
| Familial diabetes (%) | 29.7 | 36.4 | 32.8 |
| Familial obesity (%) | 23.4 | 20.0 | 21.8 |
| Familial myocardial infarction (%) | 18.8 | 21.8 | 20.2 |
| Familial hyperlipidaemia (%) | 4.7 | 1.8 | 3.4 |
1mean ± standard deviation
*asterisks denote statistically significant results (p = 0.044)
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Piśmiennictwo
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