Prevalence and Determinants of Hypertension in Coastal and Estuarine Communities

Hypertension has been a globally burden disease since the 1990s. It is known as one of the risk factors for cardiovascular disease. For more than a decade, hypertension was the most prevalent cause of death around the world, and one of ten leading causes of death in lower-middle-income countries including coastal and estuarine regions. As a preventable illness condition, hypertension has been found to be associated with some modifiable factors. This review aims to identify the prevalence and determinants of hypertension in coastal and estuarine regions, in high, low and middle-income countries.

To carry out this review, four journal databases including Proquest, Science Direct, Google Scholar, and DOAJ were used to address the prevalence and determinants of hypertension in coastal and estuarine regions both in high, low and middle-income countries.

The prevalence of hypertension ranged from 6.445% to 85.1%. In coastal regions, the prevalence of hypertension ranged from 6.45% to 51.1%, while the prevalence of prehypertension ranged from 26.5% to 39.75%. In estuarine regions, the prevalence of hypertension was about 25.29%. The highest prevalence both in prehypertension and hypertension was observed in Kerala, India. This is while the lowest prevalence was observed in China. High sodium intake is strongly associated with an increased risk of hypertension. Other risk factors including older age, lower education, gender, and lower economic status; body weight status (overweight or obese), health behavior (physical inactivity, daily smoker, heavy alcohol drinking), and psychosocial stress (depression), were all linked to hypertension.

According to the findings of this study, it can be stated that strategies are needed to improve the prevention of hypertension in coastal and estuarine regions, particularly managing and modifying some modifiable factors.