What Growth Charts Are Best?

Discussion “The value of growth assessment is thus its principal utility as a key screening tool in order to assess children’s general well-being, to identify faltering and excessive growth, to evaluate maternal lactation performance and infant feeding practices, and to manage her children with medical conditions known to adversely affect growth,….” Thus having assessment tools is important. Growth charts are assessment tools measuring height/length, weight, head circumference and body mass index. Some commonly used growth charts are: WHO child growth chart standards They were developed using long-term assessment of children in Brazil, Ghana, India, Norway, Oman and the United States. The children studied had to live in homes where the infants were mainly breastfed until 12 months of age, had no maternal smoking and lived in socioeconomic conditions favorable to growth. Therefore they are considered standards for optimal growth for children. The WHO standards are currently the best charts available for children < 2 years of age, international populations that do not have more specific data for their geographical area, or potentially for immigrant children as these are international growth charts. The WHO standards are also very good at identifying children with poor growth or excessive weight especially in the first 2 years of age. The WHO standards “…depict normal human growth under optimal environmental conditions and can be used to...
Source: PediatricEducation.org - Category: Pediatrics Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Source Type: news