Clinical Growth Charts

The clinical growth charts reflect modifications in the format of the individual charts, whereby two individual charts appear on a single page, and data entry tables have been added. The clinical charts have the grids scaled to metric units (kg, cm), with English units (lb, in) as the secondary scale. Clinical charts are available for boys and for girls. The available clinical charts include the following:

Infants, birth to 36 months:

Length-for-age and Weight-for-age
Head circumference-for-age and Weight-for-length

Children and adolescents, 2 to 20 years

Stature-for-age and Weight-for-age
BMI-for-age

Preschoolers, 2 to 5 years

Weight-for-stature

The clinical charts for infants and older children were published in two sets.

Set 1 contains 10 charts (5 for boys and 5 for girls), with the 5th, 10th, 25th, 50th, 75th, 90th, and 95th smoothed percentile lines for all charts, and the 85th percentile for BMI-for-age and weight-for-stature.
Set 2 contains 10 charts (5 for boys and 5 for girls), with the 3rd, 10th, 25th, 50th, 75th, 90th, and 97th smoothed percentile lines for all charts, and the 85th percentile for BMI-for-age and weight-for-stature.

Set 1 has the outer limits of the curves at the 5th and 95th percentiles. These are the charts that most users in the United States will find useful for the majority of routine clinical assessments. Set 2 has the outer limits of the curves at the 3rd and 97th percentiles for selected applications. Pediatric endocrinologists and others who assess the growth of children with special health care requirements may wish to use the format in set 2 for selected applications.

Two summary files, each with all 10 clinical charts in set 1 or set 2 are also available. These summary files contain the clinical charts from either set 1 or set 2 as described above.

Infants (birth to 24 months) must be measured for length, and the sex appropriate length-for-age or weight-for-length charts for infants, birth to 36 months must be used to plot the measurements. At age 24 months and older, if children can stand unassisted and follow directions, stature should be measured and plotted on the stature-for-age chart for children (2 to 20 years). Otherwise, between 24 and 36 months, length can be used in place of stature.

BMI-for-age charts are recommended to assess weight in relation to stature for children ages 2 to 20 years. The weight-for-stature charts are available as an alternative to accommodate children ages 2-5 years who are not evaluated beyond the preschool years. However, all health care providers should consider using the BMI-for-age charts to be consistent with current recommendations.

All individual 2000 CDC growth charts have an initial publication date of May 30, 2000. For various reasons, modifications were made to charts after the initial publication date. For example, the individual charts were modified to create the clinical charts, which were made available on October 16, 2000. Subsequent modifications were made to selected clinical charts to correct or enhance particular aspects of the scales on the graphs. In all cases, the data points in the corresponding data file for each modified chart remain unchanged from the initial release on May 30, 2000. Where applicable, when selected clinical charts were further modified, the date is indicated on each chart. The clinical growth charts for stature-for-age were modified because the scale for inches was not correctly aligned with the metric scale. The clinical growth charts for infant length-for-age and infant weight-for-age were revised to improve the appearance of the scale for inches on the length charts by extending the indicators at ½ inch increments, and enhancing alignment of the English with the metric scales on both the length and weight scales.

Users should use the most recent version of each chart, as available on the growth charts web site.

To view, print, and reproduce clinical growth charts

All clinical growth charts may be viewed, downloaded, and printed in Adobe Acrobat. For routine viewing on a computer monitor and printing on a laser printer, the individual charts are available as PDF files (Black and White). All clinical charts have been colorized for viewing and printing. When routed to a color printer, the clinical charts for boys will print in blue and the clinical charts for girls will print in red. Otherwise, these same charts can be routed to a black-and-white printer, and will print in black-and-white. Higher resolution PDF files (Color) are available to provide the highest resolution and are intended to be used as a high quality print master for quantity production when using the services of a commercial printing facility. The recommended ink colors for printing are Pantone 206 red (for girls) and Pantone 286 blue (for boys). The recommended paper weight is 80#. Charts should be printed as two-sided copies, in the following combinations for each sex:

Infants, birth to 36 months: