[Somatic development indices in children and youth of Warsaw].

During the period 1996-99 in the Laboratory of Anthropology of the Department of Growth and Development of Children and Youth of the National Research Institute of Mother and Child in Warsaw, cross sectional anthropometric study in 6366 Warsaw children and youth (3152 hoys and 3214 girls) aged 1 month to 18 years was carried out. The aim of the research was to elaborate new, up to date reference data and to make a description of the biological status and the course and character of changes occurring in this population during the last 20 years. Children aged up to 3 years were selected by random choice from the Outpatient Paediatric Department registry, children aged 4-18 years were drawn by a two-step procedure: in the first step, nursery schools and primary and secondary schools were drawn and in the second step classes were drawn. Unified anthropometric methods and instruments were used. This paper contains 64 tables of means, standard deviations and percentile values and 64 percentile charts of 15 anthropometric traits and 17 calculated indexes, useful for growth evaluation and monitoring, nutritional status assessment and also for scientific research.