Food & Nutrition

Arab Journal of Food & Nutrition
35. Anthropometric Measurements of a Group of Girls Aged (10-15) Years, and
Their Relationship with the Nutritional Status and Puberty Indicators (1999)
Lotus Abul Haija\ University of Jordan
Supervisor: Dr. Salma Tukan
This study was conducted to investigate the relationship between some anthropometric
measurements and the onset of menarche. The study included 622 female
students aged 11.0 - 15.9 years from various schools in Zarka.
Body weight, height, circumferences of mid upper arm, waist and hip, skinfold
thicknesses of biceps, triceps, subscapular and suprailiac and some indices including
body mass index (BMI) and waist to hip ratio, as well as, percentage of body fat were
studied.
Most of the participants in this study (95%) had normal BMI values and about
5% were overweight. At the onset of menarche, the percentage body fat was (17.2%),
the appropriate average body weight, height, and BMI are about 49(kg), 156 (cm) and
20.01 respectively.
The average age at menarche for the girls living in Zarka was 12.3 years. There
was a highly seasonal rhythm of menarche with highest peak in summer and another
small peak in winter irrespective of whether the girls had started menstruation recently
or sometime ago. When pre and post-menarcheal girls were compared for
anthropometric measurements, the postmenarcheal group has significantly higher
mean body weight, height and percentage fat.
The results obtained in this study indicate that most of the girls participated in
this study had normal BMI values when compared with reference data. The avenge age
and percentage of body fat were nearly similar to results obtained by other workers in
different parts of the world.
190
Volume 189 11, No. 25, 2011