A longitudinal study of growth in Newcastle upon Tyne adolescents.

White Newcastle upon Tyne schoolchildren born in 1962 were examined at approximately half-yearly intervals from 9 to 17 years of age. During the last year of compulsory education losses to follow-up became selective with respect to socio-economic background, and the results reported here are restricted to 564 boys and 669 girls seen regularly between the ages of 10 and 15 years at least. Newcastle adolescents were slightly shorter and lighter than the London children on whom Tanner's British Standards were based.

Weight-for-height in adolescence.

Weight-for-height in adolescence was investigated on the basis of observations on 669 boys and 753 girls. It was found: (a) that given the age, the expected weight of individuals of the same height changes considerably with pubertal status; (b) that the change in weight for a given change in height also depends on pubertal status, and (c) that these relations vary with age so that chronological age should be taken into account when constructing weight-for-height standards. Interpretation of weight-for-height standards is briefly discussed.

Malaria infection of the placenta in The Gambia, West Africa; its incidence and relationship to stillbirth, birthweight and placental weight.

The incidence of placental malaria at parturition and its effects on the conceptus have been investigated in The Gambia, West Africa. Malarious placentae occurred in 1300 (20.2%) of 6427 singleton births, in 32 (18.

A birth-to-maturity longitudinal study of heights and weights in two West African (Gambian) villages, 1951-1975.

Records of heights and weights kept for more than 25 years for two neighbouring Gambian villages have been used to describe the pattern of growth. There was no secular trend in height. Children who died during the investigation were smaller and lighter than the survivors, but the interval between the last available dry-season measurement and death was not associated with the degree of deficit in height and weight.

Menarche in Newcastle upon Tyne girls.

Age at menarche was recorded for 699 white Newcastle upon Tyne girls taking part in a longitudinal study of growth and development during puberty. Girls from large (5+) families started menstruation about five months later than girls from small families. This effect was observed only among girls with fathers in manual occupations.

Pubertal changes in boys and girls in Newcastle upon Tyne.

669 boys and 753 girls born in 1962 and living at home were observed at approximately half-yearly intervals from 9 to 17 years of age. Mean ages of reaching various developmental stages were calculated for voice change and facial hair in boys, menarche and breast development in girls, and for axillary hair in both sexes. Peak height velocity and age at which it occurred were also calculated for both sexes.

Post-menarcheal menstrual cycle in British (Newcastle upon Tyne) girls.

Data for the first 36 menstrual intervals immediately following menarche were analysed for 298 girls studied in Newcastle upon Tyne. The mean cycle length decreased from 49 . 5 days for the first cycle in 29.

Heritability of stature in a West African population.

Heritability of stature in a West African population is calculated from longitudinal data collected over 26 years. Statistical and analytical difficulties encountered in the study include those due to variation in stature with age, sex, recording and measuring, variation in number of offspring, variation in number of spouses, and heterogeneity of within-sibship variances. The structure of the population allows a half-sib analysis which is particularly useful in interpretation of the intrafamilial correlations and regressions.

Skeletal maturation of Hong Kong Chinese children in the first five years of life.

This report describes the skeletal maturity during the first five years of life of 492 Chinese children in Hong Kong in a longitudinal study. Hand-wrist radiographs taken half-yearly were assessed by the Tanner-Whitehouse method and rated according to the TW1 20-bone self-weighting maturity score. Skeletal age was in advance of chronological age in both sexes, but significantly more so in females, especially between 18 months and three years.

Comments on the critical metabolic mass and the age of menarche.

Data from Frisch and Revelle (1971) and Frisch et al. (1973) are used to show that some of their biological conclusions relating body composition to age at menarche follow directly from arithmetical operations on the two observed items of information: weight and height. This emphasizes the dangers of drawing biological conclusions from derived, as opposed to observed, data.

The diets of preschool children in Newcastle upon Tyne, 1968-71.

1. Ninety-one families containing 140 children under 4 years of age at enrolment were studied. At 1-monthly intervals, the children were weighed and measured and qualitative information about feeding habits was obtained.

Foetal growth from 50 to 150 days of gestation.

Weight and several linear measurements have been related to postmenstrual age in a series of fresh, apparently normal foetuses, ranging in age from 8 to 21 weeks. Although the correlation between these variables and age was high, the prediction of foetal age from such measurements can never be precise, due in part to difficulties inherent in the concept of postmenstrual age. The average relationships agreed in general with those in previous reports, including those based on spontaneous abortion material.

Human foetal measurements between 50 and 150 days of gestation, in relation to crown-heel length.

Weights and a number of linear measurements were related to crown-heel length in fresh apparently normal foetuses ranging from 8 to 21 weeks' post-menstrual age. The average relationships agreed remarkably well with results reported many years ago on the basis of preserved specimens mostly from spontaneous abortions. There was no evidence of sex differences.

Eruption of permanent teeth in West African (Gambian) children in relation to age, sex and physique.

Dental records of 635 West African (Gambian) children within the age range of 4.5-14 yr yielded 2108 examinations for boys and 1863 for girls. There was no difference between eruption ages of homologous permanent teeth on the left and the right side of the same jaw.

Assessment of oral glucose tolerance data.

Characteristics of the 'clinical value index' (Harding et al., 1973) are examined. It is shown that the definition of the index makes it unsuitable for the comparative evaluation of various methods of assessing the results of an oral glucose tolerance test.