Accuracy of weighing infants with the diaper on in primary health care
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5712/rbmfc10(36)978Keywords:
Validity of Tests, Body Weight, Infant, Primary Health Care, Child Health ServicesAbstract
Objective: to estimate the bias introduced by weighing infants with the diaper on in primary health care. Methods: we enrolled infants who were about to be weighed at a primary care center and weighed each infant twice - once without the diaper and once with the diaper on - after the scale had been tared with a dry diaper. The bias was calculated, as the percentage difference in weight, by first subtracting the no-diaper weight from the diaper-on weight and then dividing the result by the no-diaper weight. Results: we enrolled 30 infants from July 23 to August 1, 2013. Most infants were present for a scheduled medical doctor’s visit, and their diapers had been changed less than 45 minutes before. The mean percentage difference in weight was 0.3% (95% confidence interval, 0.2% to 0.5%). Conclusion: we found a substantial agreement between the two weighing techniques. The bias (that is, loss of accuracy) introduced by weighing infants with the diaper on compared favorably with the precision of the standard technique and the physiological variability of the infants’ weights. Our findings suggest that weighing infants with the diaper on may be a valid technique for the cross-sectional assessment of the nutritional status in primary health care settings. However, further research is needed before it is used for the longitudinal assessment of the weight velocity.
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