Blood pressure trends and life style risk factors in rural India

A door to door survey of a random sample of 448 subjects (> or = 15 years of age) of Kodamendhi village (near Nagpur) revealed a prevalence of hypertension of 4% rising to 19% in more than 60 years age group. One of the main goals of the study was to search for social, behavioural and life style risk factors and provide baseline information on blood pressure distribution in rural Indian population, information regarding which is scarce from Central India. The relationship between alcohol consumption, smoking, obesity, education, income and diet (assessed by a questionnaire administered by trained interviewers) to blood pressure were studied, in multivariate context. Separate multiple linear regression analysis, performed in males and females with mean blood pressure (MBP) as dependent variable showed that the MBP increased significantly with age (p = 0.000) and males had significantly higher MBP than females (p = 0.002). In males, BMI (p = 0.000) and alcohol intake (p = 0.008) were significantly related to MBP while smokers had significantly lower MBP than non smokers (p = 0.004). Per capita income was a significant predictor of MBP in females (p = 0.000). There was no relationship with education and diet.