Predictors of Cardiovascular Disease Risk Among adolescents in Indian Context

Abstract

India harbors the world's largest population of adolescents, marking a period of substantial transformation encompassing various facets, including physical, mental, emotional, and social aspects in an adolescent's life. There is a paucity of data on theprevalence of underweight, overweight, and obesity in Kerala, especially about the magnitude of the problem amongadolescents. Nurses play a key role in primordial prevention and thus limited studies on socioeconomic status (SES) and anthropometrics among new-generation adolescents in India. Hence it aimed to determine cardiovascular risk and relationships between Socioeconomic Status (SES) and anthropometrics among adolescents. Late adolescents attending college (593 males, 647 females) were enlisted through the utilization of a multistage cluster sampling approach. Participants completed a Modified Kuppusamy SES Scale 2021 to estimate the socioeconomic status of the family. The anthropometric measurement of the adolescent was assessed based on the standard procedure of measurement of height, weight, waist, and hip circumference. Simple percentage and Pearson correlation tests were used for statistical analysis. Most adolescents are from Semi-urban (47%) and rural (40%) with SES of the lower middle (41%) and upper middle (23%). Identified that 45% of adolescents were underweight and no correlation (r = -0.003) was found between SES and anthropometrics score, Whereas the study found that 64% of adolescents fall under the category of cardiovascular disease risk based on anthropometric measurements. It is concluded that nurses should prepare a primordial strategy to address this global pandemic for a better tomorrow.