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Articles

Growth Deficits in Chilean School Children¹

Hugo Amigo^*2, Patricia Bustos^*, Claudio Leone and María Eugenia Radrigán^*

^* Department of Nutrition, School of Medicine, University of Chile, Santiago, Chile and Department of Pediatrics, School of Medicine, University of Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo, Brazil

²To whom correspondence should be addressed at Department of Nutrition, School of Medicine, University of Chile, Independencia 1027, Santiago, Chile. E-mail: hamigo{at}machi.med.uchile.cl.

Stunting is highly prevalent in Latin American countries regardless of socioeconomic performance. The purpose of this study was to identify risk factors of growth deficit among children starting primary education whose parents were of short stature compared with those whose parents were not of short stature, in the poorest districts of Santiago, Chile. A case-control study was carried out with two types of cases. Case 1 included children whose height was between -1.0 and -3.0 (SD) of the height/age of the National Center for Health Statistics/World Health Organization standard and whose parent’s height was below -2.0 SD (n = 115). Case 2 included stunted children (as defined previously) whose parent’s height was above -2 SD (n = 76). Controls were children whose stature was ±0.5 SD and whose parent’s height was also above -2 SD (n = 115). Logistic regression models were carried out for case 1 and 2 children compared with the controls. Similar risk factors were found in both models, without any significant interaction: these included history of malnutrition, drunkenness in the family, lack of health care, unhygienic housing conditions, small length at birth and short period of exclusive breastfeeding. The most important risk factors for case 1 children were a history of malnutrition [with an odds ratio (OR) of 5.26 and confidence interval (CI) of 2.68–10.34] and short length at birth (OR = 4.87, CI 2.18–10.92). For case 2 children, the most important risk factors were a history of malnutrition (OR = 4.58, CI 2.20–9.53) and unhygienic housing conditions (OR = 4.29, CI 1.76–10.48). In conclusion, similar factors explained growth deficits in children starting primary school independent of the parent’s height, suggesting that genetics would have a limited impact at this age and at this socioeconomic level. To reduce stunting in countries with an epidemiological profile such as that of Chile, it is still important to reduce adverse environmental conditions.

KEY WORDS: • growth deficit • risk factors • school children • Chile