Modeling of Body Mass Index Reference Values in Turkish Boys Aged 5–18

Abstract

The aim of this study is to model the growth curves for body mass index (BMI) of Turkish boys aged 5–18 years. In addition, it was aimed to compare the growth curves we created in this study for children aged 5–18 years with the growth curves created by Neyzi et al., which are widely used and accepted as a reference in our country, as well as the reference growth curves of the World Health Organization (WHO). The research group consisted of a total of 5870 volunteer boys aged between 5 and 18 years who participated in sports trainings within sports schools in 26 districts of Istanbul province. The data of height and weight measurements obtained from the participants during the data collection process were classified according to age groups in Microsoft Excel program, and BMI scores were calculated. In this study, the “LMS Method” developedby Cole in 1988 and used by the WHO and Neyzi et al. was used to create growth (percentile) curves and tables. BMI median values showed a linear increase with age and the percentile values obtained in this study (%3,9 for p5–p95, 7), WHO (%5,5 for p5–p95), and Neyzi (%3,5 for p5– p95) percentile values.