The effect of zinc supplementation and 2 and 3 gr doses of l-arginine on the increase children s height

Introduction: Stunting in children is one of the primary manifestations of nutritional status and chronic malnutrition, which can lead to complications such as illness, premature death, mental retardation and functional impairment. Inadequate nutrition and nutritional deficiencies are one of the most important causes of growth deficiency in these children. Among the nutrients, zinc and protein both have a significant impact on bone and muscle growth in terms of quantity and quality. L-arginine is an essential amino acid for children that the body cannot produce naturally. L-arginine can increase the height of children by increasing the secretion of growth hormone. Zinc has aneffect on the secretion of some hormones and also has an effect on increasing vitamin D production and thus calcium absorption in bone growth and height increase. Zinc, on the other hand, affects the activity of the somatomedin hormone, which is stimulated by the growth hormone secreted by it . Methods: The present study is a review of articles submitted to PubMed, SCOPUS, Embase, ProQuest and Google Scholar up to 2020. Inclusion criteria included: 1) clinical trial studies 2) human studies 3) studies in English and cellular, review, animal studies, letters to the editor, and articles in non-English languages were excluded .These articles have investigated the effect of l-arginine and zinc supplementation on child development . Results: After searching the database, title and abstract of 565 studies were evaluated and finally 15 eligible studies were considered. The results of five studies showed that the effect of 3 gr / day l-arginine supplementation on children height was more than the effect of 2 gr / day. In 8 studies,the positive effects of zinc and l-arginine supplementation on improve height growth were found, and in 2 studies the results were contradictory . Conclusion: As a result, supplementation of zinc daily with 1 mg / kg body weight and 3 gr daily larginine in stunted children is recommended for Improve height growth.

Keywords:

zinc , l-arginine , stunting