Prevalence of prehypertension and its association with obesity and lipid parameters in medical students.

Background: Medical field is said to be associated with a lot of stress, both mental and physical. And medical students suffer more because during their training period they undergo a lot of stress in the form of little physical activity, altered food habits and social habits like smoking and alcohol. For this reason we decided to conduct this study amongst the medical students. Objective: Our objective of this study is to determine the prevalence of prehypertension among Medical college students and study the association between prehypertension and other cardiovascular risk factors like lipid profile and Body Mass Index (BMI). Methods: A total of 300 medical students of first to final year MBBS (18-23 years) were selected randomly for this study. Each participant’s data was collected, BMI calculated. BP was measured by a mercury sphygmomanometer. Subjects were classified as 3 groups Normotensive, Hypertensive and Prehyperensive. Blood samples were collected and Fasting plasma glucose, serum cholesterol, triglyceride and HDLc, were estimated by using commercially available kits in automated analyzer. Serum LDLc, and VLDLc (Very Low Density Lipoprotein-cholesterol) were calculated by Friedwald's equation. All the data were analysed by using SPSS software. Results: The overall prevalence of PHT was 38%. Prevalence of prehypertension is more in females. Among the students 75% had normal BMI, 20% were overweight, 3% were obese and 2% were underweight. BMI of Prehypertensive was significantly more than the normotensive students. BMI of female students are more than the male students. Among the lipid parameters, prehypertensives showed significant increase in TC, TG, LDLc than normotensive students. TC, TG, LDLc were high for female students than male students. Total prevalence of dyslipidaemia was 17.4% out of which 14.9% was hypercholesterolemia, 8.15% was hypertriglyceridaemia, 5.6% had high LDLc level and 10.4% had low HDLc level. There was a significant positive correlation between SBP with BMI, TG, TCh and VLDLc and significant positive correlation between DBP with TG and LDLc. There is negative correlation of SBP and DBP with HDLc. This might point out the contributory role of dyslipidemia and obesity towards prehypertention. Conclusion: Prevalence of prehypertension was high and associated with a higher BMI and dyslipidemia .Prevalence of dyslipidemia is 17.4%. Hypercholesterolemia is more prevalent. Students should change their life style. They should do yoga, meditation regularly to cope with stress. They should avoid oily foods to decrease cholesterol level.