An epidemiologic study of cough in young college students in Guangzhou / 中华流行病学杂志

ABSTRACT

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To study the prevalence of cough and its risk factors in young college students in Guangzhou.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>Using a questionnaire with uniform scheme, a cluster-randomized sampling survey was conducted among young college students in Guangzhou. Fluoroscopy of chest was performed in subjects with persisted cough longer than 8 weeks.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>There were 1087 cases with complete data from 1091 people including 648 males, 439 females with an average age of 21.16 years old. The total prevalence of cough was 10.9%. Difference in prevalence of cough between males and females showed no significance (10.3% vs. 11.9%, P > 0.05). There were also no significant differences between male and female in prevalence rates of acute cough (6.9% vs. 8.7%, P > 0.05) and chronic cough (3.4% vs. 3.2%, P > 0.05). Under chronic cough condition, cough was more likely to be the only or major symptom than under acute cough condition (77.8% vs. 44.6%, chi(2) = 11.166, P < 0.01). Nasal disease was an important risk factor to the development of chronic cough, which was found in 33.3% of the patients with chronic cough and when having chronic nasal diseases.</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>Cough seemed a common disorder in young college student in Guangzhou and there was no significant difference in prevalence between males and females. Nasal disease was an important risk factor to chronic cough.</p>