Correlations between the blood pressure and other health variables in Spanish adolescents

The aim of this paper was to study the correlations between blood pressure and other health variables in Spanish adolescents. 204 boys and 270 girls (aged 13-17 years, with written parental consent,) from 18 private and 17 public educative centers from 16 of 21 districts of the city of Madrid, constituted the representative sample. 12.7% of the boys and 35.6% of the girls were inactive or sedentary. Socioeconomic status significantly determined the physical activity of girls, especially in the age group 16-17 years. The tobacco consumption by girls was significantly greater than by boys. A significant inverse relation of tobacco consumption with physical activity was found for boys. Among the girls, 47.4% were lightly overweight to obese as opposed to 14.7% of boys. A significant association between adiposity and physical activity in the girls was observed. The averages for the systolic/diastolic blood pressure were 125.6/71.3 mm Hg in boys and 118/69.4 mm Hg in girls. A significant relation between gender and systolic blood pressure was found. A relation between physical activity and diastolic blood pressure for boys was observed (69.9 mm Hg for active or very active and 74.1 mm Hg for moderately active to sedentary). The lack of existing relations between blood pressure and others variables support the hypothesis that these variables require a longer-term to become obvious cardiovascular risk factors. We believe, therefore, that girls and those from lower socioeconomic status should receive high-priority attention concerning health-related habits.