Occupational stress and hypertension among health professionals in Owerri, Imo State
Date
2024-08
Authors
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Publisher
Federal University of Technology, Owerri
Abstract
Stress among health professionals is relatively common, and seemingly, this is a worldwide problem. Although prevalent, it is a major risk factor of hypertension. The main aim of this study is to determine the association between occupational stress and hypertension among health care professionals in Owerri, Imo State. The descriptive cross sectional study was carried out between November and December 2021 among health care professionals in Federal Medical Centre Owerri, Imo State Specialist Hospital, Federal Polytechnic Nekede Medical Centre, Federal University of Technology Owerri Medical Centre, Alvan Ikoku Federal. College of Education Medical Centre, and Holy Rosary Hospital Emekuku. Multistage, Stratified and simple random sampling techniques were used to select the 400 health care professionals who participated in the study. A pretested well structured questionnaire, a motech digital sphygmomanometer and a standard stress measuring scale (PSS) were used for data collection. Statistical package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21.0 was used to analyse the data. Hypothesis were tested using chi-square test and p-value <0.05 was considered to be statistically significant. Results indicated higher prevalence of stress (35%) than hypertension (15%). Females had same hypertension rate as males (15%). Age group 36-45 had higher hypertension rate (22.9%) than age group <25 with 0% hypertension rate. Lab. Technicians were more hypertensive (20%) than Lab. Scientist who had the least (3.3%) . PhD as highest level of education accounted for (16.7%) while Masters accounted for (13.6%). Highest rate of hypertension was recorded among the married respondents (17.3%). Those who had family history of hypertension had higher hypertension rate (18.8%) than those with no family history of hypertension who had (9.6%). Although the findings showed that there is no direct association between occupational stress and hypertension, there is still need to educate the health care professionals on the stress coping strategies and the risk factors of hypertension to reduce to the barest minimum the occurrences.
Description
This thesis is for the award of Master of Public Health (MPH) in Epidemiology and Bio-statistics option
Keywords
Occupational stress, hypertension, health professionals, Department of Public Health
Citation
Amams, A. J. (2024). Occupational stress and hypertension among health professionals in Owerri, Imo State (Unpublished Master's Thesis). Federal University of Technolgy, Owerri, Nigeria