Hypertension Status of Medical Student & its Association with Paternal & Maternal Hypertension

Abstract

Background: To determine prevalence of hypertension in medical students and its association with maternal and paternal hypertensive status

Methodology: This cross-sectional study was conducted at Kabir Medical College, Peshawar, from March 2017 to September 2017. A total of 300 medical students were recruited using non-probability sampling technique. Students with any chronic illness were excluded while others were included. A pre-designed questionnaire was used after measuring blood pressure using Mercury Sphygmomanometer. SPSS V 25.0 was used; descriptive statistics were calculated, while chi-square/fisher exact test was applied to measure the association. P-value ≤ 0.05 was taken as significant.

Results: Mean age of sample was 21.72±1.472 years, among which 58.7% were male and 41.3% females. Among students 87.7% were normotensive, 6% pre-hypertensive and 6.3% hypertensive. All professional years’ students participated with the most 24.7% from 1^st Professional. As we moved towards higher year of professional education the hypertensive status got increased showing 24.49% (maximum frequency) in Final Professional while it was only 8.1% in 1^st Professional. The same increase was observed for age where it increased to 50% of hypertensive stage at 25 years. Association was insignificant for gender and professional year with the type of hypertension having P-value=0.845 and P-value=0.169 respectively, and significance for family history with P-value=0.000                            

Conclusion: It can be concluded that hypertension is more prevalent in female gender with advance age and professional year of education. The students with both maternal and paternal positive history of hypertension are more prone to this lethal disease with a significant association while for gender and professional year of education the association was insignificant.

Keywords: Hypertension, Pre-hypertension, Maternal, Paternal, medical students.