Prevalence, awareness, treatment and control of hypertension in employees of factories of Northern Greece: the Naoussa study

Abstract

The objective of this study was to examine the prevalence and the levels of awareness, control, and treatment of hypertension in workers, technicians and clerks of factories of the city of Naoussa. A total of 1976 employees in 19 units were examined. From those, 1937 (1045 men and 892 women), 15-73 years of age, were included in the analysis. Every employee was examined twice with 1 week's interval between the two examinations. Analysis was performed using the 140/90 mmHg hypertension threshold. In every visit, three blood pressure (BP) measurements were taken with at least 1-min interval between them. In the analysis only the average BP of the second clinic visit was used. In total, hypertension prevalence was 30.5% (32.1% for men and 28.7% for women respectively, P ¼ 0.10). The levels of awareness, treatment, and control of hypertension in hypertensive patients were 18.6%, 11.8%, and 2.2%, respectively. The levels of awareness and treatment differed significantly between men and women (13.4 vs 25.4%, Po0.001 and 9.6 vs 14.8%, Po0.05), but there was no difference in the levels of control (1.5 vs 3.1%, P ¼ 0.18). Hypertension prevalence, awareness, and treatment differed also between patients o45 and X45 years of age (22.0 vs 53.2%, Po0.001, 9.7 vs 28.4%, Po0.001 and 6.5 vs 17.7%, Po0.001, respectively). In conclusion, the prevalence of hypertension in our study's population is high, while the levels of awareness, treatment, and control are disappointing and should be significantly improved. There is also a difference in awareness and treatment in favour of women compared to men and in favour of patients X45 years of age compared to those o45 years of age.

The prevalence of hypertension and its association with other cardiovascular disease risk factors in a representative sample of the Lebanese population

“…Such findings had actually been confirmed by other studies. 10,[20][21][22] In this study, the percentage of CVD risk factors tended to increase by 3-4 times in the 41-50 years age group compared to the 30-40 years age group. Therefore, it is very important to address the issue of prevention early in life because the precursors of the disease are present long before clinically acceptable levels of hypertension are recognized.…”

“…Compared to neighbouring and other Mediterranean countries, Lebanon has a lower prevalence of hypertension. [21][22][23][24] However, compared to other countries, 25,26 Lebanon still has a high prevalence of hypertension and requires urgent interventions for prevention, treatment and control. Moreover, Table 2 shows that all CVD risk factors (hypertension, diabetes, hyperlipidaemia and obesity) tend to increase with age in both genders.…”

The changing regional pattern of ischaemic heart disease mortality in southern Europe: still healthy but uneven progress

“…However, what is available suggests that, in Spain, there appears to be a south-north gradient, disadvantaging the southern part not only in access to health services but also in terms of quality of care, with common diagnostic and therapeutic procedures for myocardial infarction being less frequently prescribed in the south 38. In Greece, there still seems to be considerable scope for improvement in awareness and control of hypertension 39 40…”

Prevalence, Patterns of Treatment, and Control of Hypertension in Predialysis Patients with Chronic Kidney Disease

“…In both CKD patients [23,24] and the general population [28], older age was associated with inadequate BP control, but other data suggest that this association can be cancelled from increased awareness and treatment of hypertension among the elderly with CKD [20]. Male gender was previously associated with worse hypertension control in CKD [20] and the general population [1,16,28,36]; this was largely attributed to differences in awareness and treatment, indicating a better perception of hypertension-associated risks among females. Further analyses, however, suggest this discrepancy between genders to be erased in patients with stage 3–5 CKD [37], a finding related again to increased hypertension awareness and treatment in late stages.…”