Suranga Dassanayake
University of Colombo
USA
Title: Comparison of anthropometric characteristics of national level teenage swimmers and non-swimmers in Sri Lanka
Biography
Biography: Suranga Dassanayake
Abstract
This study was conducted with the objective of assessing and comparison of Body Mass Index (BMI) and body fat of national level female teenage swimmers and age and sex matched non athletic non swimmers in Sri Lanka as the childhood obesity has become a worldwide health problem which is solutions are being searched for. 90 female teenage swimmers who qualified for the School Nationals Meet were recruited to the study and also similar numbers of age, sex and geographical area matched controls. BMI was calculated using the body weight and height while the body fat was analyzed using the seven site skin fold method. In our results, statistical significance was found in mean BMI scores (kg/m2) and Lean Body Weight (LBW) of female swimmers (MBMI=19.03, SD=1.47 and MLBW=42.03, SD=3.74) and non-swimmers (MBMI=22.34, SD=3.07 and MLBW=39.31, SD=2.24) with a p value 0.0001. Mean fat weight (FW) in kg and Fat percentage (Fat %) of female swimmers (MFW=9.39, SD=1.93 and MFat%=18.22, SD=3.35) and non-swimmers (MFW=13.28, SD=2.24 and MFat%=25.11, SD=3.08) were statistically significant with p values for FW 0.001 and for Fat % 0.0001 respectively. This concludes that fat deposition is higher in female non athletic non swimmers from their teen ages which may lead to complicated health problems in there later lives. Swimming has caused to keep fat weight at a lower level and lean body mass at a higher level and therefore swimming can be recommended for children to control their body fat.