Cohort study for monitoring cardiovascular risk factors in children using a primary health care service: methods and initial results

Abstract

An awareness of the presence of cardiovascular disease risk factors since childhood is essential to guide health promotion policies. The aim of this paper is to present, together with the main results, a methodological proposal to estimate both incidence and prevalence of these factors over time and their associated socio-demographic aspects in a population attending a primary health care unit, within Brazilian Unified National Health System. An open cohort design was adopted, starting in 2004 with a sample of 356 children aged between 5 and 9. In the second wave, in 2008, 126 children were enrolled and 205 were reevaluated. Socioeconomic variables, food intake, physical activity, anthropometric measures (weight, height and waist size), lipidogram and glycemia were collected. Results indicate a high prevalence of dyslipidemia, and an increase of excess weight and sedentary activity between both surveys. Some 55% of children were found to have lower values of HDL-cholesterol. The methodological proposal was considered adequate for the monitoring of cardiovascular disease predictors in poor urban populations.

Inatividade Física Em Crianças: Uma Revisão Sistemática De Estudos Realizados No Brasil

“…Por fim, sete artigos foram selecionados [11][12][13][14][15][16][17] Na Tabela 1 são apresentadas as informações sobre as características das publicações incluídas nessa revisão. Na maioria dos estudos, o delineamento da pesquisa foi transversal, e um deles foi de coorte 16 . Quanto ao tamanho da amostra, em apenas uma publicação foi observada quantidade inferior a 100 crianças 15 .…”

“…Na maioria dos estudos o questionário foi utilizado, sendo que em um deles foi utilizado um recordatório 11 . Em relação ao processo de amostragem e procedimentos de seleção, em três estudos foi empregada a seleção por conveniência 11,15,16 .…”

Feeding children in a favela in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: how much is spent and what would be the cost of a healthy diet?

“…The prevalence of overweight/obesity in children in the same population was 24.8% in 2008. 12 Thanks to largescale social and infrastructure investment, the community's Human Development Index, once the fifth lowest in Rio, is now equal to the city average (0.792). 13 Data collection among the study participants -a panel study of prepubescent children, aged 5 to 9 years-began in 2004.…”

“…The methodology for the selection of participants is described elsewhere. 12 The study began with 356 children, with 126 and 152 children added in the second and third stages of data collection, respectively. Including only prepubescent children, 690 questionnaires were analyzed.Fifty-six children appearedin two rounds.…”

“…Details of validation are presented elsewhere. 12 Questionnaires were applied to the children's caregivers, with participation of the child, by previously trained nutritionists. Furthermore, since Rio de Janeiro free schools meals are planned according to nutritional recommendations -they include grains, vegetables and fruits-data was also collected regarding participants' school meal consumption.…”