BACKGROUND Hypertension has become a major public health threat especially for developing countries with more people living in rural setting. As it is largely asymptomatic, majority of people are totally unaware about their blood pressure status. This unawareness is more dangerous for people living in difficult areas or hard to reach areas as they are deprived of adequate health care, resulting in missing timely screening of hypertension. Even if they are diagnosed, they do not adhere to the lifestyle changes and regular follow up visit to health centers. We wanted to determine the prevalence of hypertension among tribes. METHODS A cross-sectional study among tribal population in a rural area of Katihar district in Bihar state was carried out including all persons with age of 18 years and above. Altogether 820 subjects were surveyed in the tribal villages of Katihar district. Information regarding age, sex, education, occupation, socio-economic status, religion, additional salt intake, physical activity, body weight, height, body mass index (BMI) and blood pressure was collected by house visit and recorded in the pre-designed and pretested schedule. Statistical analysis was done using SPSS v 20. RESULTS The prevalence of hypertension among 820 subjects in this study was found to be 15.7 percent (n=129). The prevalence of hypertension increased with age, BMI, additional salt intake, smoking and drinking alcohol and was found to be statistically significant. In comparison to females (12.1%), males (18.6 %) have high prevalence of hypertension. A binary logistic regression analysis also revealed that hypertension odds increased significantly with increasing age (1.83 times), additional salt intake (2.31 times), smoking (10.9 times), drinking alcohol (4.09 times) and in males (1.97 times). The likelihood of hypertension with increasing BMI was found to be less but it was not statistically significant (p= 0.548). CONCLUSIONS The prevalence of hypertension among tribal population in a rural area was found to be high. They appear equally affected by the changing lifestyle due to migration, acculturation and urbanization overshadowing their heavy working attitude.
