Influence of BMI on foot posture alignment in resting gait of secondary school children in Lagos metropolis aged 10 to 18 years

Abstract

The study was to determine the influence of BMI on foot posture alignment in the resting gait of secondary school children. A localized, two-stage, stratified, cross-sectional, and descriptive survey was carried out in 10 secondary schools involving a sample secondary student population of 518 students, 235 males, and 283 females. The result shows that there was a statistically significant association (X2=32.4345, p=0.000) between the BMI of student’s cohort and their age. There was also a statistically significant association between different age groups and gender at p<0.046. Using the statistics of Pearson chi-square analysis, age-dependent variability of BMI (X2=32.4345, p=0.000) was established amongst the study population. The BMI of students for the varying foot alignment was not normally distributed, instead, it was skewed to the right. According to the Kruskal-Wallis H test, there was no statistically significant difference in BMI between the three age cohorts of student’s foot alignment in resting gait; Pearson chisquare, X2 (2) = 4.575, p=0.1015. The distribution of the left foot posture alignment according to the FPI scale indicates that overall, 82.13% of males and 84.40% of females showed normal foot alignment whereas 10.64% and 9.22% of male and female students respectively confirmed slight foot pronation while 7.23% of male students and 6.38% of female students showed slightly supinated feet. This study shows that BMI has no influence on FPI in resting gait. The high incidence of underweight amongst the students’ population could be a reflection of the low socioeconomic status of many families.