To investigate the relationship between thyroid volume and multiple body indexes such as urinary iodine level, height, and weight, respectively, in order to provide a theoretical basis for evaluation of goiter disease in the future.

The height and weight were measured, and urine samples were collected from children aged 8 to 10 years old from 10 township schools of Nangqian County in Qinghai Province in 2014 and urinary iodine was tested via the As (Ⅲ)-Ce⁴⁺ catalytic spectrophotometry method. Meanwhile, the thyroid volume was immediately measured via the B-ultrasound method. Statistical analyses were employed finally to assess the difference and correlation between thyroid volume and multiple physiological indexes including urinary iodine level, height, weight, gender and age.

The thyroid volume of 773 children aged 8 to 10 years old showed skewed distribution (W = 0.088, P < 0.05), with median of 3.53 ml and quartile of 3.05, 4.15 ml. The thyroid volume was not significantly different between different urinary iodine levels (H = 1.644, P > 0.05). There were significant differences of the thyroid volume among different height groups, weight groups and age groups (H = 59.845, 64.888, 28.590, P < 0.05), and the thyroid volume was positively correlated with height weight and age, respectively (r = 0.389, 0.359, 0.155, P < 0.05).

The thyroid volume is related to the level of children's physiological parameters, such as age, height, weight. Therefore, the diagnosis of thyroid volume via the B-ultrasound method for a individual child should not only take age, but also height and weight into account, to reduce the diagnostic error of goiter disease.

Thyroid; Urine; Iodine; Height; Weight; Age