Argentine references for the assessment of body proportions from birth to 17 years of age

Abstract

Introduction.Abnormal body proportions may indicate skeletal disorders; therefore, their detection has great clinical significance. Objectives.To estimate centiles for head circumference/height (HC/H) and sitting height/height (SH/H) ratios, and assess their diagnostic usefulness among a group of children with skeletal dysplasia. Methods.Centiles 3, 10, 25, 50, 75, 90 and 97 for HC/H and SH/H ratios were estimated with the LMS method using Box-Cox transformation to normalize data distribution for each age. Q-Q plot tests were applied to evaluate normality of residuals and the Q test to calculate goodness-of-fit. Results.The sample included 4818 girls and 4803 boys, all healthy, between 0-17 years old. The median of the SH/H ratio for each age decreased from 0.67 at birth to 0.57 at age 4. At 12 years of age, values reached 0.52 and 0.53 for males and females, respectively, remaining unchanged until age 17. The median of the HC/H ratio decreased from 0.45 at 6 years old to 0.34 at 17 years old for both sexes. Z-scores for SH/H among 20 children diagnosed with hypochondroplasia were better at showing abnormal proportions than the SH/H ratio not adjusted by age. Conclusions.Estimated centiles for HC/H and SH/H ratios show that the most dramatic changes in body proportions occur in the prepubertal period. These references allow an earlier detection of abnormal body proportions in children with skeletal dysplasia.

Clinical charts for surveillance of growth and body proportion development in achondroplasia and examples of their use

“…UK references for sitting height and leg length (Dangour, Schilg, Hulse, & Cole, 2002) might be appropriate body proportion complement to growth references from the WHO since both reflect population of similar height. Yet, arm span references per se are rare, especially for the entire growth period from birth to adult ages, and references for relative sitting height are limited to studies from the Netherlands (Fredriks, van Buuren, van Heel, et al, 2005; Gerver & de Bruin, 2011) and Argentina (del Pino, Orden, Arenas, & Fano, 2017) which are indispensable for assessment of body disproportion and diagnosing of skeletal dysplasia. Thus, considering that the majority of differences in height is associated to leg length (Bogin & Varela‐Silva, 2010) it might appear somewhat unfair to compare leg length and arm span in achondroplasia to a very tall reference.…”

Sex‐specific differences in somatic investment and strategies of physical activity among Portuguese schoolchildren

“…For the study here presented, Σ 3 SKF z-score regressed by chronological ages may display in which ages, number of standard deviations are away from the average of the skinfolds displayed in our sample. On the other hand, anthropometric ratios by using body height are also frequent (Bogin & Varela-Silva, 2010;Del Pino et al, 2017;Freedman, Blanck, et al, 2013;Quanjer et al, 2014). Therefore, for the aim of the study, the Σ 3 SKF/Height regressed by chronological ages, was applied to eliminate the relationship between the corporal growth and skinfold tissues growth by age.…”

Growth reference charts for children with hypochondroplasia

“…A number of studies have sought to describe the impact on growth conferred through HCH (Appan et al, 1990; Bridges et al, 1991; Çetin et al, 2018; Del Pino et al, 2017; Meyer et al, 2003; Pinto et al, 2014; Rothenbuhler et al, 2012; Saunders et al, 2006). Others have demonstrated a differential effect on growth depending upon the underlying FGFR3 variant (Friez & Wilson, 2008; Heuertz et al, 2006; Rothenbuhler et al, 2012).…”