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SEASONAL VARIATIONS IN WEIGHT OF CHILDREN ATTENDING AN UNDER‐FIVES CLINIC IN LESOTHO
Author(s) -
COHEN NICHOLAS,
CLAYDEN A. D.
Publication year - 1978
Publication title -
acta pædiatrica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.772
H-Index - 115
eISSN - 1651-2227
pISSN - 0803-5253
DOI - 10.1111/j.1651-2227.1978.tb16272.x
Subject(s) - medicine , pediatrics , incidence (geometry) , demography , weaning , weight loss , seasonality , obesity , physics , sociology , optics , statistics , mathematics
. The incidence of weight loss between successive visits, prevalence of under centile 3 weight‐for‐age and over centile 97, showed a marked bimodal annual variation for 1243 children attending an under‐fives clinic. 9 949 weighings on 661 boys and 682 girls over a five year period, contributed to the database. Season of birth also significantly influenced the centile distributions of weight‐attained‐for‐age. Children over 1½ years old showed considerably higher rates of weight loss (about 1 in 5 children attending in their fifth year of life), than children younger than the mean age of weaning. The rates of weight loss, together with seasonal variation, was considerably higher for a group of ‘Regular Attenders’ to the clinic, than for a group of ‘Low Attenders’. Seasonal influences on growth need to be taken into accounts in evaluating the quality of care and outcome produced by under‐fives clinics.