Abhijit Dastidar1, Smriti Pathak Dutta2, Hiranya Saikia3
BACKGROUND
The trends in blood pressure over time in children may be important predictors of subsequent trends in adult hypertension. The Western standards cannot be applied to Indian children, because of difference in factors as ethnic, socio-economic, dietary habits, environmental, etc. between Western and Indian countries. Hence, there is a need to establish the normal blood pressure standards for Indian children and so this study was done to study the blood pressure profile of school going children in the tea tribe community in and around Dibrugarh town.
Aims of this study are
1. To find the blood pressure pattern of school going children of tea garden workers in the age group of 6–12 years.
2. To find the blood pressure pattern in relation to height, body weight and body mass index in the above age group.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Blood pressure was recorded in the right arm in the sitting position by using a standard Hg sphygmomanometer using appropriate cuff sizes. Three readings were taken at an interval of at least 5 minutes and the average of these three readings was considered as the blood pressure of the individual.
RESULTS
The mean systolic and diastolic blood pressure for both boys and girls shows an increasing trend with the increase in age. The differences in case of both systolic and diastolic blood pressure between the two sexes in all the age groups are found to be statistically insignificant (p >0.05).
Both SBP and DBP are positively correlated with age, height, weight and BMI (p<0.01).
CONCLUSION
The high risk children need to be considered for close followups for modification of risk factors by advising lifestyle changes like reduction in intake of salt.
