Goitre prevalence and epidemiological features in children living in areas with mildly excessive iodine in drinking-water.

摘要

The prevalence of goitre in areas with mildly excessive iodine in drinking-water is still under debate. The aim of the present study was to explore the prevalence of goitre and its epidemiological characteristics in these areas using WHO criteria. To this end, three towns with a median water iodine (MWI) of 150-300 micro g/l were selected randomly in Hengshui City of Hebei Province of China, and one town with a MWI of 105 micro g/l was chosen as a control. A total of 452 children in the three towns and 120 children in the control town were randomly selected to measure thyroid volume (T_vol) by ultrasound. The goitre status of these children was judged using the criteria recommended by the WHO. The overall goitre prevalences in the three towns were 24.6% (111/452) by age-specific T_vol and 33.0% (149/452) by body surface area (BSA)-adjusted T_vol, which were significantly higher than that in the control town by both age-specific T_vol (14.0% (17/120), P=0.015) and BSA-adjusted T_vol (17.5% (21/120), P=0.001). Significant differences were found neither in goitre prevalences across sex by both age-specific T_vol (P=0.078) and BSA-adjusted T_vol (P=0.692) nor in that across age group by both BSA-adjusted T_vol (P=0.461) and age-specific T_vol (P=0.183). The present study found a high prevalence of goitre in children living in areas with mildly excessive iodine in drinking-water in Hebei Province. No significant differences were found in goitre prevalences across sex and age group. These results suggest that the T_vol reference values recommended by the WHO could be too low for Chinese children.