Are Children Scheduled for Ventilation Tubes Insertion Overweight? A Cohort of Israeli Children.

To study the hypothesis that children scheduled for ventilation tube insertion (VTI), a surrogate procedure reflecting otitis media (OM) presence, are overweight or obese.

Charts of Israeli children aged 0 to 9 years undergoing VTI with or without adenoidectomy between 9/1/17 and 3/31/19 in a secondary level hospital were retrospectively identified. We compared their mean body mass index (BMI, kg/m²) to the mean BMI of a control group comprised of children who underwent surgeries unrelated to OM (fracture fixation/reduction, inguinal/umbilical hernia repair, meatotomy, appendectomy). BMI measurements were plotted on gender- and age-matched curves to determine BMI percentile, and were also compared to the national pediatric overweight/obesity data. Normal weight was defined as BMI percentile <85%, overweight was BMI percentile between 85% and 97%, and obesity was BMI percentile >97%.

The VTI group included 83 children (mean age: 3.5 ± 1.8 years). The control group included 77 children (mean age: 6.3 ± 1.9 years). No statistically significant difference was found in the mean BMI values between both groups (P = .22). When compared to age- and gender-adjusted 50th BMI percentile of the general pediatric population, the mean BMI of the VTI group was significantly higher: for boys, 16.9 versus 15.2 (P < .01), and for girls, 16.6 versus 15.3 (P = .03), but not in the control group: P = .16 (boys) and P = .11 (girls).

Children undergoing VTI were overweight when compared to their age- and gender-matched peers. This observation was more noticeable in boys.