Prevalência de excesso de peso e fatores associados ao índice de massa corporal/idade em crianças

Abstract

Overweight in children, the figure is currently an important problem of public health worldwide, resulting in a negative impact on short or long term health and quality of life of this population. The identification of the magnitude of overweight in children and the factors associated with body mass index/age (BMI/A), it is necessary, since, know the problem is essential for the development of intervention measures aimed at preventing and control of this nutritional disorder. For that, we developed a chapter of literature review and a results article. The review chapter addresses the prevalence and risk factors associated with overweight in children as well as the health impact of the same, and the coping political strategies currently adopted by the Brazilian government for prevention and control of this disease, as well as experiences successful of overweight facing other countries. The results of study intended to identify the prevalence of overweight (≥ 2 Z score) and factors associated with BMI/A in Early Childhood Education Centers of children in Maceio, Alagoas. For this we performed a cross-sectional study with 355 children 17-63 months evaluated from march to July 2014. The nutritional status was classified by the indices Height/Age, Weight/Age, Weight/Height and BMI/A. To identify factors associated with BMI/A, we used bivariate analysis, taking as dependent variable, the BMI/A, which was analyzed as a continuous variable. Multiple linear regression was performed, using the enter method. Crude and adjusted analyzes for confounders were calculated for each exposure variable inserted in the model. The prevalence of overweight was 7.6 %. Higher mean Z scores for the BMI/A, were observed among children from families with higher family income, which had fridge, living with less than 3 brothers, had < 48 months, birth weight ≥ 2500g and said bottle feeding. In the final model remained as factors associated with the injury, birth weight ≥2500g, maternal education ≥ 5 years and garbage collection < 2 times/week. In conclusion, the prevalence of overweight surpass those of malnutrition among children, resembling the national prevalence,, which sets as a major public health problem in this population. Overweight affected the studied population, reaching in particular children born with birth weight ≥ 2500g, children from families with poor access to garbage collection and those whose mothers had higher educatio. Thus, it is most necessary investment in public health policies, as well as food and nutrition surveillance and health assistance and adoption of intervention measures, geared to children and their families, especially those related to the school environment.