Growth charts for Iran

Abstract

Growth charts for children aged 2-18 years old in Iran are presented. The charts are based on a random cluster sample survey of 3301 children living in urban Tehran, whose heights and weights were measured during the 1990-1992 National Health Survey of Iran. Because of differences between the data from the different provinces, these data were used as a representative subset of the total data. Charts were constructed using Healy's method, as modified by Pan, Goldstein and Yang, and are shown to fit the data well. Simulations show that the structure of the data does not affect the centile estimates. These charts may be used for all urban children in Iran and modifications are suggested to enable them to be used for rural children, who are generally smaller than urban children.