Prevalence and Distribution of Hypertension in Urban Health Centre Area of Bathinda

Essential hypertension may be considered to be the result of interactions between genes and environment. Distribution of hypertension by age and gender is conspicuous. Important environmental factors are obesity; smoking; alcohol intake; physical inactivity; dietary excess of sodium and fat; deficiency of potassium and fibre intake; and psychosocial stress.

The present study is a cross-sectional study, conducted at the Bhucho Mandi, which is an urban field practice area of the Adesh Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, Bathinda, Punjab, India. Hypertension was defined using the JNC7 criteria (7^th report of Joint National Committee on Prevention, Detection and Treatment of High Blood Pressure). It is based on the average of two or more properly measured, seated BP readings on each of two or more visits. It defines hypertension as blood pressure (BP) more than 140/90 mmHg. The data were collected by the interns on community medicine duty during the month of January 2013.

The overall prevalence of hypertension was 43.33%, with pre-hypertensive condition seen in 9% of the cases, hypertension grade I in 24.67%, grade II in 5.67% and grade III in 4% of the cases. Mean diastolic BP was 88.29 mmHg, SD (Standard deviation) 10.16, skewness 0.896 and range 50 mmHg. Mean systolic BP was 132.74 mmHg, SD 15.05, skewness 0.518 and range 90 mmHg. Highest number of hypertensives were in the age group of 60–69 years, followed by the age group of >70 years. BP in females showed higher prevalence than in males (51.66 and 48.34% h respectively).