Objective. To present a clinical version of the 2000 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) growth charts and to compare them with the previous version, the 1977 National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) growth charts. Methods. The 2000 CDC percentile curves were developed in 2 stages. In the first stage, the empirical percentiles were smoothed by a variety of parametric and nonparametric procedures. To obtain corresponding percentiles and z scores, we approximated the smoothed percentiles using a modified LMS estimation procedure in the second stage. The charts include of a set of curves for infants, birth to 36 months of age, and a set for children and adolescents, 2 to 20 years of age. Results. The charts represent a cross-section of children who live in the United States; breastfed infants are represented on the basis of their distribution in the US population. The 2000 CDC growth charts more closely match the national distribution of birth weights than did the 1977 NCHS growth charts, and the disjunction between weight-for-length and weight-for-stature or length-for-age and stature-for-age found in the 1977 charts has been corrected. Moreover, the 2000 CDC growth charts can be used to obtain both percentiles and z scores. Finally, body mass index-for-age charts are available for children and adolescents 2 to 20 years of age. Conclusion. The 2000 CDC growth charts are recommended for use in the United States. Pediatric clinics should make the transition from the 1977 NCHS to the 2000 CDC charts for routine monitoring of growth in infants, children, and adolescents.

Anthropometry is an effective and frequently performed child health and nutrition screening procedure. The value of physical growth data depends on their accuracy and reliability, how they are recorded and interpreted, and what follow-up efforts are made after identification of growth abnormality. The new National Center for Health Statistics percentiles can be used to improve identification of potential health and nutritional problems and to facilitate the epidemological comparison of one group of children with others.

Our clinically applicable method assigns a child's or adolescent's BMI value to a group with a known probability of overweight or obesity in adulthood.

Stature is an important variable in several indices of nutritional status that are applicable to elderly persons. However, stature is difficult or impossible to measure in the nonambulatory elderly person, or its value may be spurious if measured in those elderly persons with excessive spinal curvature. Simple equations are presented for estimating the stature of elderly men from a recumbent measure of knee height and for elderly women from a recumbent measure of knee height and age. The 90 per cent error bounds for these equations for an individual are about plus or minus 6.0 cm. Knee height is highly correlated with stature.

Overall, US girls are not gaining reproductive potential earlier than in the past. The age at menarche of non-Hispanic black girls is significantly earlier than that of non-Hispanic white and Mexican American girls.