Prevalence of blood pressure and blood sugar in a sample of older people: a situation analysis across different socio-economic neighborhoods in Lahore, Pakistan

ABSTRACT

The blood pressure and blood sugar levels were measured from a sub-sample of older persons of both sexes across six urban localities of Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan. A survey was conducted on 921 respondents in September 2006 to accomplish our PhD research; 300 respondents aged 50 years and above were tested for blood pressure and blood sugar levels. Systolic and diastolic blood pressures increased with age, as expected, while diabetes was more prevalent in younger cohort of respondents. Exactly 17.6% of the total number of respondents were suffering from hypertension stage-2 [SBP> 160/DBP> 100 mmHg] and 21.0% of them had> 180 mg/dL sugar level. Gender based comparison indicated that women suffered more from hypertension and diabetes than their male counterparts. Both the hypertension and diabetes were more prevalent among the respondents from lower socio-economic strata. These findings are expected to underline the need for the due policy interventions for improving the life quality of our elderly