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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| Self-reported versus measured weight and height in an older adult meal program population | | Author(s) | Laura I Vailas, Susan A Nitzke |
| Journal title | The Journals of Gerontology Series A: Biological sciences and medical sciences, vol 53A, no 6, November 1998 |
| Pages | pp M481-M483 |
| Keywords | Age groups [elderly] ; Meals services ; Weight ; Height ; Measurement ; Participant observation ; United States of America. |
| Annotation | Self-reported weight and height are used to compute ponderal indices (e.g. body mass index - BMI) in studies where it is impractical to obtain objectively measured data. Little is known about the associations between self-reported and measured weight and height in older adults. Participants in luncheon club and home-delivered meal programmes in a rural Wisconsin county recorded their height and weight on a questionnaire as part of a study on nutritional risk and quality of life. Objective measurements of height and weight were made on the same day. Data for 131 subjects, ranging in age from 62 to 92 years, were analysed to evaluate associations between self-reported and measured weights and heights. Correlation coefficients suggested that self-reported weight was somewhat more valid than self-reported height in this population. However, self-reported weight was misreported by 10 pounds in more than 20% of the sample. More data is needed to evaluate the usefulness of self-reported data for older people's weight and height. Judging from this study, such self-reported data, if used at all for older people, should only be used as a continuous variable rather than for classifying subjects into relative weight categories. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-990302008 A |
| Classmark | BB: NR: 4X6: 53H: 3R: 3DB: 7T |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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