Environmental, urinary iodine status and prevalence of goitre among schoolchildren in a high altitude area of Saudi Arabia

Objective: this study aimed to assess the iodine deficiency, prevalence of goitre among schoolchildren and measuring environmental iodine in taif city, saudi arabia. methods: a cross-sectional multistage cluster-sampling methodology was done on 1887 schoolchildren. their urinary iodine concentration (uic) and goitre prevalence was assessed. blood level of triiodothyronin, thyroxine and thyroid-stimulating-hormone was carried out for students with normal, mild; moderate and sever iodine deficiency. the iodine content of salt, water and soil was also assessed. results: goitre prevalence was 7.4% and about 71% of the participants had uic less than 100μg/l. an inverse relationship between median uic and the percent prevalence of goitre was found. the mean serum t3, t4 and tsh were 1.05ng/dl, 6.81μg/dl, and 5.69miu/l, respectively. a significant positive correlation was found between the mean value of urinary iodine and the mean value of both t3 and t4. while a significant negative correlation between the mean value of urinary iodine and the mean value of tsh was also noted. conclusions: the results revealed the presence of a potential public health problem of iodine deficiency among school going children in high altitude areas of saudi arabia. there is a need to monitor and evaluate the salt iodization process, and distribute adequately iodized salt in the affected areas.