Efficacy of Calcium Supplementation in Children

Objective: To ascertain calcium nutritare of Jining children and efficacy of calciuxn supplemenation with different sources of calcium. Methods: The hair calcium levels of 2 108 children ages 3 ~ 6 were determined, an experimental study was conducted to observe efficacy of four kinds of calcium preparations, the diet enriched with calcium and different calcium supplementation methids. Results: Calcium deficiency was common among children of Jining city, the practices of calcium suppleznentation was oot satisfacory. The significant differences were found in efficacy of calcium supplementation among different calcium preparations and among different supplementation methods. The diet added with calcium could no meet the need of gnwing children for calcium. Conclusions: According to the diet structare of children in Jining, an intermittent calcium supplementation method was recommenden, namely, children of the city should be provided with about 400 mg of additiond calcium per day for 15 days, which was repeated after an interval of 7 days. This procedare was performed twice every half a year. Meanwhile,the markets for calcium preparations should be readjusted.