Abstract
To determine the awareness of cardiovascular risk factors among university students in Turkey. Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death in developed countries. The use of tobacco products and unhealthy diet are prominent habits that increase the risk of CVD. Healthy university students (n = 2450) aged between 18 and 22 years in Istanbul filled out the questionnaire about the awareness of CVD risk factors and participated in this cross-sectional study. They were asked several questions with regard to the importance of CVD risk factors. The leading responses for men and women were, respectively, high cholesterol (58.3; 72.3%), stress (58.8; 71.8%), hypertension (50; 64.2%), smoking (53.1; 58.7%), obesity (46.8; 64.3%), diabetes (41.7; 52.7%), inactivity (43.3; 47.8%), and CVD in family history (31.8; 44.4%). Unhealthy diet (9.7; 15.3%), exposure to second-hand cigarette smoking (24.4; 34%), and poor socioeconomic status (22.6; 22.3%) were also considered to be important. The study also revealed that men disregard the risk factors more frequently. Another comparison between body mass index groups revealed that obese subjects gave significantly lower importance to cardiovascular risk factors. Observations indicate that awareness levels of CVD risk factors have to be improved among university students. It is emphasized that primary healthcare workers are very important in the screening of CVD risk factors in an opportunistic and systematic way and in providing consultancy on changing risky behaviors (diet, smoking, etc.). Therefore, it is of utmost importance that primary healthcare workers make interventions to reduce the risk level by determining the CVD risk.
Highlights
Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are one of the leading causes of death all over the world, and by 2030, more than 23 million people are expected to die from CVD according to the World Health Organization (WHO, 2013)
To extend our analysis further, we analyzed the awareness of CVD risk factors among university students in relation to the four categories of Body mass index (BMI) in the same cross-sectional study
Consistent with literature, the results of the present study revealed that the level of awareness about CVD risk factors is higher among women
Summary
Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are one of the leading causes of death all over the world, and by 2030, more than 23 million people are expected to die from CVD according to the World Health Organization (WHO, 2013). A previous study in Turkish adult population (aged >20 years) indicated that the prevalence of heart diseases and CVD is 6.7% (6.2% in males and 7.3% in females) and 3.8% (4.1% in males and 3.5% in females), respectively (MedCHAMPS, 2012). Another study conducted in 2006 indicated the prevalence of CVD at 3%, 11%, and 27% in 39–49, 50–59, and >60 years of age, respectively (Onat et al, 2007; MedCHAMPS, 2012). According to the study by TUIK (2016), the leading mortality is from CVD, with 40.4% of deaths from noninfectious diseases. The Framingham study has investigated the causes and formation of CVD in the United States since 1930s. According to the results of this study, the number of standard risk factors of CVD are elevated total cholesterol, high systolic blood pressure, cigarette smoking, low highdensity lipoprotein cholesterol, obesity, unhealthy diet, poor nutritional status, age, family history, and male gender (D’Agostino et al, 2001)
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