Selected indices of health status in preschool children from Pila and their families as a risk factor of diet-related diseases.

BACKGROUND Diet-related diseases have their origin as early as in childhood; therefore, preventing them should start from the first years of life. Each assessment of dietary intake should be preceded by assessment of health status indices, especially familial diet-related diseases prevalence. OBJECTIVE The objective of this study was to analyse selected indices of health status in preschool children from Pila and their families in order to assess the risk of developing diet-related diseases. MATERIAL AND METHODS The studied population comprised 128 children aged 4 to 6 years, 63 girls and 65 boys, who at- tended two preschools in Pila. Parents filled in questionnaires concerning selected indices of health status of the children and their families. Statistical analysis was carried out by means of the IBM SPSS Statistics 21.0 computer programme. The studied children were divided according to gender. RESULTS Statistically significantly higher percentage of boys than girls took medicines, 41.5% vs 21.0%. As many as 49.6% of mothers and 33.1% of fathers had higher education and most of the parents assessed the economic status of the family either as good or very good. Most of the studied children took dietary supplements. The highest percentage of both girls and boys, 34.2% and 33.8%, respectively, took vitamin and mineral supplements. The prevalence of familial diet-related diseases ranged from 3.2% in the case of hyperlipidaemia to 65.6% in the case of hypertension. CONCLUSIONS The high percentage of the studied preschoolers who took dietary supplements shows the need to educate parents about the adverse effects of excessive intake of these nutrients and about the necessity to take such supplements only on recommendation of the paediatrician. The analysed indices of health status of the studied children and their families show the need to pay much attention to balanced diet and daily physical activity in order to prevent diet-related diseases in the studied preschoolers and their families.