Prevalence of obesity and overweight among military personnel in North of Jordan and some associated risk factors

Abstract EN

Objective: Obesity and overweight has emerged as one of the important issues in the Jordanian community.

Military is important part of this community and it is important to understand such problem and it's associated factors in the military; so as to introduce early measures to increase awareness and provide solutions among the study population.

The current study was conducted to do determine the prevalence of overweight and obesity among military personnel serving in North of Jordan and to investigate some of its associated risk factors.

Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted in army units in North of Jordan from October 2011 to April 2012.

Multistage sampling technique was used to recruit 570 male participants, who then completed a self-administered questionnaire.

The questionnaire included questions about socio-demographic variables, the nature of work, physical activity, dietary and life style history.

Anthropometric measurements were recorded by using one standardized scaling instrument for height and one for weight to measure Body Mass Index (BMI).

SPSS was used to analyze the data using logistic regression analysis with backward selection methods.

The adjusted effect of independent variables was measured on overweight and obesity.

Adjusted Odds (OR) and 95% Confidence Intervals ( 95% C.I.) were reported.

Results: The current study found that about 36% of participants were overweight and 16.8% were obese; the combined percentage of obesity or overweight among study population was 53.1%.

The significant predictors of overweight were age, educational level, exercising score, impression about weight gain, dietary patterns/ frequency of having meals, and self-satisfaction about health and physical appearance.

As for obesity, the significant predictors were marital status, educational level, residency, self-assessment of health status, impression about gaining weight, frequency of having meals, frequency of health complain, perception about weight gain because of their unhealthy, low active lifestyle , and perception about the possibility of getting out of shape.

Conclusion: According to the current finding; overweight and obesity pose a serious problem among military personnel in Jordan and there seems to be an urgent need to initiate and activate interventions specially designed to this group that aim at increasing physical activity and controlling risk factors