Factors Associated With Hypertension Among Adults Aged 50 Years And Above In Moyo General Hospital, Westnile Region Uganda.

Abstract

ABSTRACT

Background; Hypertension has become a significant public health burden and is one of the major leading causes of premature death globally. However, its prevalence is higher in central Uganda region (34.3% 95%CI: 32.6% to 36.0%) than northern Uganda 22.0% (95%CI: 19.4 to 24.6%) and West Nile region was 24.1%. Thus, this study seeks to assessed factors associated with hypertension among adults aged 50 years and above in Moyo general hospital.

Methods: Hospital based cross sectional study design was used to gather information on factors associated with hypertension among adults aged 50 years and above between the months of February and March 2022. Odd ratio was used to assess factors associated with hypertension at multivariate binary logistic regression analysis.

Results: Samples of 309 respondents were interviewed and out of those 61.81% were hypertensive while 38.19% had normal blood pressure. this study found factors associated with hypertension among respondents who are moving less than one km to reach nearest health facility had reduced chances of being hypertensive as compared to those who move 1km and above (OR=0.1;95%CI:0.012 to 0.852; p=0.035). Availability of hypertensive drugs at the health facility (OR=0.402; 95%CI: 0.206 to 0.782; p=0.007). Having access to hypertensive drugs from private clinics increased likelihood to having normal blood pressure (OR=3.236; 95%CI: 1.56 to 6.713; p=0.002).

Conclusions; The prevalence of hypertension is still very high in this study; therefore, its recommended that the district health team need to establish hypertension screening services at lower level health facilities to prevent moving long distance looking for it services.