The Relationship between Nutritional Status and Obesity in 8-12 Years Old Children of Rasht City

Childhood obesity is a public health challenge. Proper nutrition is one of the essential parts of healthy growth. Many of the chronic diseases of adulthood are rooted in childhood nutrition and the dietary patterns are mainly shaped in childhood. This study aimed to determine the relationship between nutritional status and obesity in 8-12 years old children in Rasht.
This research was a descriptive– analytic study performed on 975 primary school students in Rasht in 2014. Samples were selected by cluster random sampling. A questionnaire including demographic characteristics and nutritional information was used to collect data. The participants’ body mass indices were also calculated. Data were analyzed using frequency distribution statistical tests, Kruskal-Wallis, U Mann-Whitney and Logistic Regression in SPSS v.21 software.
Results showed that 20% of samples (n=195) were overweight and 18.4% (n=179) were obese. From the dietary status, consumption of fruit and vegetable (p Due to a direct connection between eating breakfast, beans, fruit, and vegetables with having a normal weight and also a correlation between fast food and chocolate consumption with obesity, it seems that family and society education is necessary to have healthy nutrition and hence healthy children.