250499 Prevalence of No known Major Risk Factors for Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Disease Among Residents of US Gulf Coast States

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Justice Mbizo, DrPH , School of Allied Health and Life Sciences, University of West Florida, Pensacola, FL
Anthony Okafor, PhD , Mathematics and Statistics, University of West Florida, Pensacola, FL
Objective: According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an estimated Americans die annually from cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases. Recent trends in chronic disease morbidity and mortality indicate a growing public health problem. These trends are manifested in the growing disparities from major diseases like heart disease and stroke especially among racial and ethnic minorities, and social and economically disadvantaged Americans. The purpose of the study is to estimate the proportion of residents of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi who are have no known major risk factors for heart disease and stroke. Methods: Using data from the 2001 and 2009 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, the study estimates the prevalence of no known major risk factors for cardiovascular disease between among adults aged 18 and above who participated in the survey in 2001 (n=15, 524) and 2009 (n=38, 920). Data were analyzed using Stata version.11.0. Results: Descriptive statistics, Chi-square test of independence and multivariate results, including confidence intervals for percentage change will be presented. Preliminary results suggest that the proportion of Gulf states residents with major risk factors has increased between 2001 and 2009. Blood pressure rates increased from 28.91% in 2001 to 46 % in 2009; cholesterol decreased from 52% to 46%; obesity increased from 34 to 64% and diabetes rates also increased by from 8% in 2001 to 15% in 2009. These differences are statistically significant at the 0.05 significance level. Discussion: Strategies for chronic disease prevention will be discussed.

Learning Areas:
Chronic disease management and prevention
Epidemiology

Learning Objectives:
1. Discuss the prevalence of risk factors of cardiovascular disease 2. Discuss strategies for reducing chronic diseases burden 3. Discuss ways of increasing the proportion of the population with no known risk factors of cardiovascular disease and stroke.

Keywords: Chronic Diseases, Risk Factors

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I teach graduate courses in epidemiology and conduct research in chronic disease epidemiology. In addition, I designed the study and are leading the data analysis.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

See more of: Statistics Poster Session
See more of: Statistics