Evaluación del estado nutricional de adolescentes en una Unidad Educativa de Ecuador

Abstract

The present study evaluated the nutritional status of 120 adolescents aged 14 to 18 years of the "Jerusalem" Educational Center of the city of Milagro, Ecuador, through the measurement of the abdominal perimeter, Body Mass Index (BMI) for age and a survey of food consumption frequency. Their results show that 72.5% of the sample is normal weight, the ratio BMI/abdominal obesity revealed that 7.1% of overweight adolescents presented abdominal obesity and 64.3% risk of abdominal obesity, for obese and overweight males, the risk of abdominal obesity was 57.1% and 62.5% respectively; 50% of male adolescents with normal BMI had a risk of abdominal obesity and 4% of abdominal obesity, in female adolescents was 48.9% and 2.2% respectively; 22% of female adolescents were overweight and 14% of men had obesity; in terms of eating habits, 90% consumes junk food and snacks during collation. These date point to the risk of early manifestations of metabolic diseases, high social and economic cost to the family and the state, which deserves the urgent implementation of nutritional policies that improve the quality of life of the adolescent population considering its integral environment

Keywords

• Adolescent
• nutritional status
• eating habits
• malnutrition