Abstract
The World Health Organization recommends adults to engage in muscle-strengthening activity (MSA) at least two times per week. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence and correlates of MSA in Croatian adults. We analysed self-reported data collected among 4561 Croatians aged ≥18 years within the European Health Interview Survey (EHIS wave 2). We calculated the weighted prevalence of meeting the MSA guidelines, and odds ratios for different population groups, adjusted for a range of sociodemographic and lifestyle variables in a multivariable logistic regression analysis. The prevalence of meeting the MSA guidelines was 8.0% (95% CI: 7.2, 8.8) in the overall sample, 5.4% (95% CI: 4.5, 6.4) among females, and 10.9% (95% CI: 9.6, 12.3) among males. We found significantly lower odds of meeting the MSA guidelines for females, older age groups, inhabitants of sparsely populated areas, those with a low education level, obese individuals, and those who did not rate their health as “very good” (p < 0.05 for all). The vast majority of Croatian adults do not meet the MSA guidelines. Public health initiatives to promote MSA in Croatia should focus on females, seniors, sparsely populated areas, people with low education, obese individuals, and those with impaired health.
Highlights
Compared to the inhabitants of densely populated areas, those who lived in sparsely populated areas had 37% lower odds of meeting the muscle-strengthening activity (MSA) guidelines
Population–representative sample, we found that the vast majority of Croatian adults do not meet the MSA guidelines
We found that the vast majority of Croatian adults do not meet the MSA guidelines, and that lower odds of meeting the MSA guidelines are associated with female sex, older age groups, living in a sparsely populated area, having a low education level, being obese, and having a lower self-rated health
Summary
Received: 8 July 2021Accepted: 21 August 2021Published: 24 August 2021Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/).Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are among the most prevalent illnesses and are the leading cause of mortality worldwide [1]. It was estimated that physical inactivity is responsible for 6% to 10% of deaths from NCDs [2]. According to the World Health
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