title: Correlation of commonly used measures of intrauterine growth with estimated neonatal body fat.
abstract: Several morphometric measures have been used to identify infants at greatest risk from aberrant intrauterine growth. 119 near-term infants were studied to answer the more basic question of how well measures, such as birthweight percentile, ponderal index, the body mass index and the weight/length ratio reflect body fat in the neonate. Skinfold thicknesses were measured as an estimate of fat stores. Multiple regression analysis revealed that the weight/length ratio showed the strongest correlation with relative adiposity, explaining 52% of the variance. Further, sequential exponentiation of the crown-heel length in body mass index and ponderal index decreased the correlation with estimates of body fat. The simple weight/length ratio, exhibiting both a close correlation with body fat and independence of gestational age, race and sex, in near-term infants may be the best morphometric measure of the nutritional component of intrauterine growth in the neonate.
authors.affiliation: Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Wayne State University/Hutzel Hospital, Detroit, Mich.
authors.forename: H M
authors.initials: HM
authors.lastname: Wolfe
authors.forename: Y W
authors.initials: YW
authors.lastname: Brans
authors.forename: T L
authors.initials: TL
authors.lastname: Gross
authors.forename: R K
authors.initials: RK
authors.lastname: Bhatia
authors.forename: R J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Sokol
mesh_terms: D000273:Adipose Tissue; D001699:Biometry; D001724:Birth Weight; D001823:Body Composition; D001827:Body Height; D005314:Embryonic and Fetal Development; D005333:Fetus / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D012044:Regression Analysis