The use of short-term increments in weight to monitor growth in infancy.

The use of weight measurements at regular intervals of 2-8 weeks in infancy is considered in the context of detecting slowing-down of growth due to nutritional or other causes. Mixed longitudinal data from 427 children in the Sudan covering the first year of life are presented. Using a simple model it is shown that measurements at short intervals are quicker to detect growth deficiencies, but at the cost of a substantial increase in the false alarm rate.