Somatometric physical development indicators of school children in Saint-Petersburg city

The physical development indicators in the context of the social and hygienic researches are important health parameters of the children’s population and indices of the social well-being of the society. With the purpose to define the modern trends of the children physical development using the random sampling technique, 6,207 school children (3,225 boys and 2,982 girls) aged from 7 to 17 years were examined in the various districts of Saint-Petersburg. The somatometry (body height, weight and ribcage circle) was carried out and the arithmetic mean values (M), and error in means (m) were calculated. The data analysis has shown that in all age groups, except for 11–12-year-old children, the indicators of the body height are higher for the boysthan those for the girls. The pubertal growth acceleration of the body height in girls becomes perceptible during the period from 9 to 13 years of age; in boys, it starts after 11 years and it is prolonged up to 15 years of age. The girls’ body weight is lower in all groupsthan that in the boys; only at the age from 11 to 13 years, the body weight is practically equal to the indicators of the boys of the same age. The ribcage circle indicators are also higher in boys than in girls in all age groups. The analysis of the annual somatometric indicator increase has revealed the considerable decrease in the value of gain in the body height in both the boys and girls on the 11th year of life as well as the body weights in boys that demands the additional analysis of cause factors. The revealed trends of the physical development of schoolchildren in the conditions of the megalopolis demand the in-depth analysis of the factors defining these tendencies with the subsequent development and carrying out of the preventive measures