ANTHROPOMETRIC INDICES AND ITS ASSOCIATION WITH IODINE STATUS AMONG SCHOOL GIRLS IN SHAHRIAR

Background and Aim: Iodine is an essential micronutrient for the regulation of physical growth as well as neural development. Insufficient iodine level leads to poor production of thyroid hormones which may cause damage to the basic life activities and somatic growth. As most studies have been done among school-aged children, this study was aimed to assess the iodine status and the anthropometric indices and the relationship between them in adolescent school girls in Shahriar, Tehran in 2016.Methods: In this cross-sectional study, 223 female students aged 14-19 years were randomly selected and casual urine samples to measure urinary iodine concentrations were collected. Height and weight were assessed using standard techniques and malnutrition status was estimated based on z-score for weight-for-age, height-for-age and BMI-for-age according to cutoffs were set by a World Health Organization (WHO) expert committee.Results: According to the WHO cut-offs, mild and moderate iodine deficiency was found in 22.4% and 14.3% of the students, respectively. Most of the students had normal height-for-age (81.1%), weight-for-age (85%), BMI-for-age (85.5%) and a total of 2.7% were underweight, 1.8% were stunting and 3.2% were wasting. No significant relationship was found between urinary iodine levels and anthropometric indices.Conclusion: The findings showed that adolescent girls in Shahriar have normal anthropometric indices but more than one third of them have iodine deficiency. Also no significant relationship was observed between nutritional iodine status and anthropometric indices

Keywords:

Urinary iodine , Anthropometric indices , Students