The Relationship of Nutritional Awareness with Hypertension with Anthropometric Indices in Menopausal Women

Hypertension is one of the most common public health problems that its prevalence is high among women, especially in menopausal women. Nutritional awareness has a special place in management of chronic diseases such as hypertension. Therefore, this study was conducted to determine the relationship of nutritional awareness with hypertension with anthropometric indices in menopausal women.
This cross-sectional and descriptive study was conducted on the population consisted of menopausal women with hypertension in the city of Qom in 2014. Of the population, 211 subjects have been selected through multi-stage sampling. The data were collected using demographic information questionnaire; anthropometric indices check list and nutritional awareness questionnaire through an organized interview after confirmation of the validity and reliability. Data were analyzed by independent T-test, Pearson correlation coefficient and ANOVA in SPSS -16. P-values less than 0.05 were reported as statistically significant.
The mean and standard deviation of age in menopausal women was 60.6±8.9 years. Most of the subjects in terms of education and job were illiterate (71.1%) and housekeeper (99.1%). The mean duration of hypertension was 6.2±5.5 years. The mean and standard deviation of nutritional awareness in menopausal women was 11.11±2.06. Pearson correlation coefficient showed a significant inverse correlation between nutritional awareness and systolic blood pressure (r =-0.03, p According to the results of this study, implementation of proper training programs in order to improve nutritional awareness is essential for menopausal women and thereby to reduce the incidence of hypertension in this group of society.