Premium
Comparison of Measured and Parents' Reported Height and Weight in Children and Adolescents
Author(s) -
O'Connor Daniel P.,
Gugenheim Joseph J.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
obesity
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.438
H-Index - 199
eISSN - 1930-739X
pISSN - 1930-7381
DOI - 10.1038/oby.2010.278
Subject(s) - medicine , body height , pediatrics , demography , body weight , sociology
The objectives of this study were to (i) compare parent‐reported height and weight to measured height and weight in children between ages 2 and 17 years, (ii) investigate correlations between magnitude of error of parent‐reported data or refusal to estimate height and weight with gender, race/ethnicity, child's age, and age‐specific BMI z ‐score, and (iii) determine sensitivity and specificity of identifying obese youth based on parent‐reported data. The authors studied 1,430 consecutive outpatients between ages 2 and 17 years at an outpatient orthopedic clinic. At the initial visit, parents completed a questionnaire including their child's height and weight; height and weight were then measured. Mean height error was very small, with slight overestimation in boys and underestimation in girls. Mean weight error increased with age ( P < 0.001), and girls had a larger mean weight error (1.29 kg, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.65, 1.45) than boys (0.85 kg, 95% CI: 0.8: 0.58, 1.12). Mean weight error also increased with age‐specific BMI z ‐score ( r = 0.32, P < 0.001). Correlation between weight error and age‐specific BMI z ‐score was higher among black children ( r = 0.45, P < 0.001) than among Hispanic children ( r = 0.37, P < 0.001) and was lowest among white children ( r = 0.29, P < 0.001). Refusal or inability to estimate weight did not correlate with age‐specific BMI z ‐score. Twenty‐one percent of children who were obese would not be identified by using parent‐reported data to calculate the BMI.