Prevalence of Risk Factors for Non Communicable Diseases among Students of the Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka: A Case Study

Abstract

Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) such as cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, cancers and chronic respiratory disease are one of the leading causes of deaths at global scale. Physical inactivity, unhealthy diet, usage of alcohol and tobacco are the major risk factors of NCDs. Further, it was found that physical inactivity is the fourth leading risk factor for the NCDs worldwide. Hence, the present study was conducted to identify the influence of gender arid physical activity on the risk of prevalence of NCDs among a sample of students of the Sabaragamuwa University. Three hundred and thirty nine students (10% from whole student population), of age 23±2, years (Male: Female, 132:207) were selected using stratified random sampling. Level of physical activity was determined by using World Health Organization physical activity recommendations. BMI and the waist: hip ratio were calculated. Results revealed that male students (81.88% ) were more physically active than female students (78.10% ). Further, it was shown that, 5.97% (4/67) of physically inactive and 3.44% (9/261) of physically active Students had NCDs risk. Active males (6.73% = 7/104) had a high risk than the females (1.27% = 2/157) due to their behavior of using alcohol, tobacco, diet and family history. Physically inactive female (8.8% = 4/45) students had a high risk than the male inactive students (0% = 0/22). When considering physically active and physically inactive students, high percentage of risky students were in physically inactive group. Female physically inactive students have a more risk of having NCDs than female physically active students. In conclusion, this study found that physical inactive students have a greater NCDs risk and also females have a greater NCDs risk than the males.