Cardiometabolic risk and its association with dietary diversity, activity patterns and the nutritional status of workers in tertiary educational institutions in South-Western Nigeria

Background: Waist-to-height ratio (WHtR) is increasingly being reported as a simple, but accurate measure of cardiometabolic risk (CMR). Therefore, the objective of this study was to determine the CMR using WHtR, and its association with dietary diversity (DD), activity patterns and the nutritional status of workers in tertiary educational institutions in South-western Nigeria. Materials and Methods: This was a descriptive, cross-sectional study carried out among 400 workers in three randomly selected tertiary educational institutions in Osun State, Nigeria. Only apparently healthy people (18 years and above) were recruited for the study. CMR was assessed using WHtR; DD was assessed using 24-h dietary recall with the 14-food groups, physical activity (PA) patterns using the short form of the International Physical Activity Questionnaire and the nutritional status of the respondents using body mass index (BMI), waist-hip ratio (WHR) and neck circumference. Bivariate and multivariate analyses were used to determine the significant predictors of CMR. The level of significance was set at P < 0.05. Results: The mean age of the respondents was 45.8 ± 10.4 years, with a male: female ratio of 1:1.1. The mean WHtR among the respondents was 0.53 ± 0.08, and 63.5% had high CMR. At the bivariate level, there were statistically significant associations between CMR (WHtR) and DD (P = 0.027), PA patterns (P = 0.030) and the various indicators of nutritional status (P < 0.001). After multivariate analysis, DD and PA were no longer significantly associated with CMR (WHtR), whereas BMI (odd ratio [OR] = 1.481; confidence interval [CI] = 1.342–1.635; P < 0.001), neck circumference (OR = 1.214; CI = 0.078–1.366; P = 0.001) and raised WHR (OR = 1.949; CI = 0.107–3.431; P = 0.021) remained significantly associated with CMR (WHtR). Conclusion: The present study found a high prevalence of CMR using WHtR and also found a significant association with BMI, neck circumference and WHR. There is a need for the early screening for CMR using WHtR, and cardiometabolic health education of workers in tertiary educational institutions in Osun state.