Perfil Nutricional de Escolares de Seis a Dez Anos de Idade Matriculados na Rede Municipal de Ensino de um Município Paraibano.

Abstract

Nutrition is key component for the protection, promotion and maintenance of health, allowing the full potential of human growth and development, and the assessment of nutritional status an essential tool for monitoring the health of individuals, especially the child population, which is more vulnerable to nutritional changes. The research aimed to determine the nutritional status of schoolchildren from six to ten years of age enrolled in municipal schools in a municipality Paraiba. This is a search field , transversal and quantitative approach , developed with students , six to ten years of age, enrolled in municipal schools in the urban area of São João do Rio do Peixe - Paraíba . The sample consisted of 110 students, ranging from six to ten years of age, chosen through a non-probability sampling. The study took place in September 2013, with data collected from a form structured in two parts. The first containing the data members and school demographics and the second and nutritional anthropometric data such as weight, height, BMI, nutritional status and nutritional disorders, through anthropometric evaluation (measurement of weight, height and BMI ). The collected data were entered into the WHO Anthro Plus, for the calculation of z - scores for the indicators: weight -for-age, height-for- age and BMI -for-age. Were then imported into SPSS for descriptive statistical analysis, and subsequently built the graphics in Microsoft Office Excel and Microsoft Office Word table for visual representation of the findings. The results showed that the sample is predominantly female ( 58,2 % ) , with most in the range of eight to nine years of age ( 59,1 % ) , with 59.1 % living in urban areas and 40,9 % in rural areas. It was found that 61,81 % of the sample are enrolled in the school year suitable for their age , however , it is noted that 38,19 % of the sample has delays of one, two or three years in their education . It was also observed that 74,54 % of respondents are eutrophic , while 25,46 % of the sample expressed some kind of change in nutritional status , particularly obesity present in 9,09 % of the school . It was also found that children residing in rural areas showed the worst results regarding the presence of overweight ( 15,55% ) , obesity ( 11,11 % ) and severe obesity ( 6,66% ) compared to schoolchildren living in urban areas. When divided by gender noticed that despite female students present prevalence of 75.00 % eutrophic, exhibiting the highest percentage of overweight ( 17,18 ) compared to males ( 6,52 ) . We conclude that high rates of overweight ( 25,46 % ) found these results support the presence of changes in nutritional status of schoolchildren , demonstrating the need to implement a continuous nutritional intervention and physical activity in schools surveyed .