Nutritional status of six to ten-year-old schoolchildren in the municipal education system of arapoti, Paraná, Brazil

Abstract

The objective of this study was to investigate the nutritional status of schoolchildren studying in the municipal education system of Arapoti, in the state of Paraná, Brazil. A total of 1,647 schoolchildren (842 boys and 805 girls) were studied, aged from 6 to 10 years. Their nutritional status was determined based on anthropometric measurements and expressed as weight for age, weight for height and height for age, according to the NCHS tables. Nutritional status was classifi ed according to the table proposed by Waterlow et al. (1977) as later adapted by Gomez (1983). Descriptive analysis and the chi-square test were employed to evaluate the signifi cance of possible associations between variables. The prevalence ratios of cases of malnutrition and overweight with relation to the age of the schoolchildren were also calculated. Analyses were carried out using Excel for Windows and SPSS version 10.0, adopting p<0.05. It was observed that 59.5% of the boys and 53.2% of the girls were well-nourished. The prevalence of malnutrition among boys was 1.4%, 10.5% and 9.1% for chronic, previous and current malnutrition, respectively. Among the girls, these prevalence rates were 1.4%, 12.2% and 11.1%, respectively. The prevalence of overweight was 9.4% for boys and 10.6% for girls. It was observed that 10.1% of the boys and 11.7% of the girls were obese. No associations were observed between nutritional status and sex or age in the sample studied here. These results indicate a relatively high prevalence of malnutrition and overweight, indicating the co-existence of both problems, which is to a certain extent coherent with the current state of epidemiological transition in Brazil, where older problems (such as malnutrition) and more recent problems (as is the case of obesity) are observed in the country.