Prevalence of Spinal Deformities in Preschool Children Living In The Sos Children's Village in Sarajevo

Abstract

The issue of spinal deformities, which occurs during phases of intense growth in children, has been recognized within the broader community. Certain categories of children are particularly vulnerable to long-term health risks in this regard, making it important to find ways to intervene early and identify such cases. This study was conducted to assess the current state of spinal posture during one of the most sensitive phases of physiological development in a special group of preschool children. In this case, the sample included 92 preschool children aged 4 to 6 years, who have been living and growing up from an early age in the SOS Children's Village in Sarajevo, without the presence of their biological parents. The assessment of poor posture was applied according to Napoleon Wolanski (1975), which is based on determining the relationships between segmental dimensions as follows: D1 – assessment of head posture (HPA), D2 – assessment of shoulder posture (SPA), D3 – assessment of chest posture (CPA), D4 – assessment of scapula posture (SBPA), D5 – assessment of spinal posture (SP), D6 – assessment of abdominal posture (APA), D7 – assessment of leg posture (LPA), D8 – assessment of foot posture (FPA). Deviations are classified according to their severity and are assessed with so-called negative points, where: 0 points indicate no deviation, 1 point indicates a mild deviation, and 2 points indicate a significant deviation. The posture results show that 15.2% of the children have scoliosis, while 13.0% have lordosis, and 7.6% of preschoolers have kyphosis. Additionally, 30.4% of the children have flat feet, which predisposes them to long-term spinal problems, and 33.7% have significant deviations in leg posture. Numerical values of the results indicate that none of the children included in the testing had an ideal shoulder posture, i.e., a score of 0, which implies no deviation from normal, while the head posture results were also extremely poor.