Reference Values for Obesity in Children and Adolescents of Nigeria

Body Mass Index (BMI),waist circumference, hip circumference and waist to hip ratio have been used as pointers to obesity/overweight. These are usually interpretable with defined norms, and or reference values. Obesity/overweight is defined to predict health risks, and provide comparisons between populations. Several of these definitions exist for many countries, and scarcely for Nigeria. Heredity,environment,culture, race,ethnicity,are some factors affecting somatotype, which is described in terms of distribution of body composition, size and type. Somatotype is important in the definition of overweight/obesity, and therefore its reference values and norms. Measures of obesity in children and teenagers’ are therefore different from that of adult population, and internationally. This study provided data on BMI, waist circumference, waist to hip ratio, waist to height ratio, and presented reference values for obesity among Nigeria children, and adolescents. We reported that waist circumference revealed the highest percentage of obesity.