Perfil epidemiológico dos professores e funcionários de uma instituição de ensino superior

Abstract

Life expectancy has increased worldwide. A higher proportion of deaths is observed among people over 70 years of age, while deaths in children under five years are decreasing. Such a scenario reflects great progress in the health of the world population. Infectious diseases are increasingly under control and, in some parts of the planet, there has been substantial progress in preventing premature deaths from chronic non-communicable diseases (NCDs). In Brazil, the probability of dying between the ages of 30 and 70 years (early mortality) due to one of the four main groups of NCDs decreased between 1993 and 2010, from 32.3% to 22.8% in men, and from 23.5% to 15.4% in women. Given this, the general objective of the study is to know the epidemiological profile and associated factors of teachers and employees of a higher education institution, the specific objectives are to identify the presence of risk factors for chronic non-communicable diseases (NTCD); describe the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of teachers and staff; to verify the association between risk factors for chronic non-communicable diseases (NTDD) and the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of teachers and staff. A cross-sectional study was carried out with teachers and employees of a higher education institution. For the inclusion criteria, all teachers and employees who were able to exercise the profession at the time of data collection were selected. Data were collected in 2016 through a questionnaire sent by email to teachers (N = 1,039) and employees (N = 1,267), totaling 2,306 individuals. The outcome, presence of chronic non-communicable disease, was assessed by self-reporting of one of the following diseases: cardiovascular disease, cancer, chronic respiratory disease and diabetes. The exposure variables were: sociodemographic, weight, height, level of physical activity, consumption of alcoholic beverages, use of tobacco, consumption of fruits and vegetables. The data were organized and analyzed using statistical software. For the quantitative variables, measures of central tendency and dispersion were calculated and normality was verified using the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test. For qualitative variables, simple absolute and relative frequencies were presented. For bivariate analyzes, the Chi-square test will be applied and for multivariate analysis, Poisson regression. 489 teachers and employees were investigated, of which 21.7% (n = 106) reported having some NCDs. The presence of CNCD was associated with a higher age group (66.7%) and with some degree of excess weight (28.3%). The presence of overweight increased the prevalence of NCDs by 7.6% and being 60 years of age or older increased the prevalence of NCDs by 41.6%. The results of this study provide guidance on new paths to be taken in health promotion as a disease reduction strategy. In this way, not only aiming to reduce care costs, but primarily aiming at the participants' quality of life, developing awareness of their responsibility and autonomy over the health-disease process.