Final Report (PDF, 2132K) - Measure DHS

6.4 Anthropometric DataThe assessment of the nutritional status of children in the ODHS is based on height and weightdata and age (in months). Procedures for converting such information into nutritional indices are wellestablished.The data necessary for calculating these indices were collected for children age 6-36 monthsof women interviewed in the survey. The interviewers responsible for collecting the height and weightdata were provided with standardized equipment and special training to ensure that they would be able tocollect accurate data (See Appendix A.3).While age in years is sufficient for most demographic analyses, age in months is required foranthropometric assessment. This is because a child can be misclassified as severely undernourished orovernourished if his/her reported age is in error by just a few months. In Ondo State it is common formothers not to know the precise ages of their children. When this occurred, the interviewer wasinstructed to aid the respondent to estimate the birth date of the child on the basis of a local eventscalendar. The degree to which there are errors in the ODHS age data can, to some extent, be assessed byexamining the data for age heaping. Figure 6.1 shows the number of children age 6 to 36 months ofrespondents in the ODHS survey. To the extent that heaping occurs in a data set, it usually occurs atmonths 6, 12, 18, 24, 30 and 36. There is no discernible pattern of heaping in Figure 6.1.In the ODHS, 1504 children between the ages of 6 and 36 months were identified and 1402 (93percent) were weighed and measured. No children were missing information on the month and year ofbirth. However, fifteen cases were excluded from the analysis because the anthropometric indices wereimprobably too high or too low, suggesting an error in the recording of information. Analysis was cardedout on 1387 cases.Figure 6.1Age Distribution of MeasuredChildren and All ChildrenNumber of Children8070605040302010+ ++ 4-++ ++++ ++ +4. + ÷ 4-++ 4- ++ ÷0 05 10 15 20 25 30 35 40Age in MonthsMeasured Children + All Children /Ondo State DHS 198666