BIRTH-WEIGHT AND CHILDHOOD SIZE IN A NATIONAL SAMPLE OF 6-YEAR-OLD TO 11-YEAR-OLD CHILDREN

The extent to which body size (stature, weight, or weight-for-stature) in later childhood is related to birth weight for normal-weight, full-term infants was explored using data from a national sample of U.S. children examined in Cycle II of the National Health Examination Survey, 1963-65. Standardized measurements of stature and weight from 4,689 white singletons ages 6-11 years were linked with birth certificate information. There were small but consistent positive associations of attained stature and weight with birth weight. The Body Mass Index (BMI), a measure of weight in proportion to stature, was also positively related to birth weight, although not as consistently, suggesting that the greater attained weight of higher birth weight children may be related to increased adiposity as well as to greater stature. However, simulations of the effect of an across-the-board increase in birth weight by 100 g or 200 g showed a negligible expected increase in the number of children with high BMI values. These findings indicate that birth weight is directly or indirectly a factor related to growth in childhood, but that upward shifts in the distribution of birth weight would have little effect on the prevalence of childhood obesity. (C) 1995 Wiley-Liss, Inc.