ABSTRACT
Growth after birth may be characterized by five stages of life, which include infancy, childhood, juvenile, adolescence and adulthood. Puberty is the process of change that occur in the body of girls, in which the body matures into adulthood. It is associated with the development of sexual characteristics as the most notable morphological changes. Menarche as a very important reproductive phenomenal changes in the life of a female was first introduced by Kish in 1910 and is defined as the first menstruation that occur in the female taking into account as the age of her puberty and maturation. Another important aspect in the reproductive life of the female that ends with some degree of suddenness is menopause. Anthropometric data are very important and have direct relationship with medical conditions of the individual. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between the anthropometric and reproductive characteristics of girls and women in Kumana Chiefdom, Kauru Local Government Area, Kaduna State, Nigeria. The subjects for this study were girls and women that were not pregnant and both physically and mentally fit. The girls (n = 415) were randomly drawn from the nine secondary schools and the women (n = 623) were randomly drawn from villages in the eight districts of Kumana Chiefdom, Kauru Local Government Area, Kaduna State, Nigeria. The data of this study were obtained through questionnaire from the girls and the women, while the body composition, blood pressure, some demographic and anthropometric variables were obtained through measurements following the appropriate standard protocol. The result obtained showed that mean of the hip circumference for the women and girls were 92.94 � 8.81 cm and 86.60 � 7.30 cm respectively. The mean waist circumference for the women and girls were 80.59 � 9.25 cm and 75.62 � 4.20 cm respectively. The mean of the neck circumference of the women and girls were observed to be 31.43 � 2.61 cm and 30.27 � 1.92 cm respectively. The mean height of the women and girls were found to be 154.84 � 6.12 cm and 151.33 � 5.86 cm respectively. The mean of hand lengths of the women and girls were 17.91 � 1.29 cm and 17.53 � 0.92 cm respectively. The 2d-4d ratio of the women and girls are 0.94 � 0.04 cm and 0.97 � 0.06 cm respectively. The means of palm lengths of the women and girls were found to be 10.27 � 0.74 cm and 10.02 � 0.65 cm respectively. The means of foot lengths of the women and girls were seen to be 23.35 � 1.37 cm and 22.88 � 1.45 cm respectively. The means of forearm lengths of the women and girls were found to be 24.83 � 1.44 cm and 22.94 � 1.05 cm respectively. The means of bone mass of the women and girls were 2.02 � 0.02 cm and 2.16 � 0.16 cm respectively. The mean values of muscle mass of the women and girls are 38.33 � 5.91 m2 and 39.86 � 2.37 m2 respectively. The means of total body water percentage of the women and girls were 53.21 � 8.65 % and 51.05 � 5.00 % respectively. The mean values of the body mass index of the women and girls are 23.73 � 3.71 kg/m2 and 19.77 � 2.79 kg/m2 respectively. The mean values of the systolic blood pressure of the women and girls were 127.86 � 19.06 and 117.95 � 11.16 respectively. The mean values of the diastolic blood pressure of the women and girls were 81.02 � 11.12 and 70.76 � 9.54 respectively. The means of weight of the women and girls were 57.06 � 9.35 kg and 45.43 � 7.83 kg respectively. The mean menarcheal age of the women was found to be 15.58 � 1.57 years and the mean menopausal age of the women was observed to be 47.17 � 5.06 years. The menarcheal age of girls whose parents had attended tertiary education was observed to be lower than for the girls whose parents had attended only primary education. The menopausal age of the women was higher for the women with tertiary education, first order of birth and house wives. Girls born in the rainy season had higher menarcheal age than those born in the dry season, while women born in the rainy season were observed to have lower menarcheal age higher menopausal age was observed in women born in the rainy season than those born in the dry season, while the number of children born by a women did not have any effect on the woman's menopausal age. Women who had tertiary education and those born in the rainy season were seen to have higher menopausal age. Left-handed girls and women were observed to have higher menarcheal age than the right-handed. The result of this study showed that, higher percentage of the women were premenopausal, only 10.11% were menopausal. Many of the women were observed not to have ever had miscarriage, few of them reported to experience menstrual pain and only 24.4% of them reported not to be menstruating, indicating that many of them have the ability to become pregnant. It was observed that the women had good perception to menopause and knowledge of menopause by these women was obtained more through teachings in the church. There was positive relationship height and hand length, palm length, forearm length, foot length, menarche and the correlation were statistically significant at p = 0.05, but the correlation between height and little finger was observed not to be statistically significant. The correlation of age at first menses with height and hand circumference were statistically significant at p < 0.01, and statistically significant with weight at p < 0.05. The correlation between menopause and age at marriage, age at first pregnancy, at first birth, at last birth were statistically significant at p < 0.01, with age at first menses statistically significant at p < 0.05. The correlation between menopause and body mass index, weight, hip circumference, digit ratio, waist circumference, neck circumference, birth order were statistically significant at p < 0.05 but with hand circumference, statistically significant at p < 0.01). The correlation between body mass index (BMI) and body circumferences was positive and significant at p < 0.05, strong positive was seen with neck and arm circumferences. It was observed that, height could only be estimated using weight and body mass index. In conclusion, it was found that the reproductive characteristics of girls and women in this study population correlated with most of the anthropometric measurements. The menarcheal and menopausal ages of the subjects were within the normal values, which indicated that the socio-economic level in this region was not below standard..