Assessment of obesity among children aged 4’17 years using waist-to-height ratio and its correlation with blood pressure

Abstract

Background: A tool to detect overweight and obesity among children should be simple, reliable, valid, and cost-effective. There is a need to monitor obesity among children in different populations. For this, there should be only one tool that is accepted worldwide or nationally which can be used to detect and compare the trends in different population settings.Objective: To assess obesity among children aged 4–17 years using waist-to-height ratio and to study its correlation with blood pressure.Materials and Methods: A hospital-based cross-sectional study was carried out among 261 children aged 4–17 years. Different variables such as age, sex, residence, parent's education and occupation, total family income per year, total family members, height, weight, waist circumference, systolic blood pressure (SBP), and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) were considered.Results: The mean age was 8.05 ± 2.75 years. The mean height was 122.71 ± 16.06 cm. The mean waist-to-height ratio was 0.45 ± 0.05. Males were more than females. Children from rural areas were more. The prevalence of obesity based on waist-to-height ratio was 19.2%. Waist-to-height ratio was significantly correlated with age, height, weight, body mass index (BMI), DBP, father education, mother education, and mother occupation. SBP was not correlated with waist-to-height ratio, but DBP was significantly correlated. As waist-to-height ratio increased by one unit, DBP increased by 0.157 mmHg. Age and weight were significantly associated with waist-to-height ratio.Conclusion: The overall prevalence of obesity using waist-to-height ratio was 19.2%. Waist-to-height ratio was significantly correlated with age, height, weight, BMI, DBP, waist circumference, father education, mother education, and mother occupation. Age and body weight were significantly associated with waist-to-height ratio.