INDICADORES DE APTIDÃO FÍSICA ASSOCIADOS À HIPERTENSÃO EM MULHERES IDOSAS: UMA ANÁLISE TRANSVERSAL

Aptidão física e hipertensão arterial em idosas

Abstract

Objective: To analyze the association between physical fitness indicators and systemic arterial hypertension (SAH) in older women. Methods: This was an epidemiological, cross-sectional study conducted with 112 older women participating in physiotherapy groups in Governador Valadares, Minas Gerais, Brazil. Functional performance was verified using the following physical fitness tests: chair stand test (CST); arm curl (AC); timed up and go (TUG); sit and reach test; and reaching behind the back. The diagnosis of SAH was self-reported. The comparative analyses used the Student's t-test for normal distributions and the Mann-Whitney U-test for non-normal distributions, verified using the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test; while the associations were verified using multiple Poisson regression models, with a robust variance estimator, through which the Prevalence Ratios (PR) and their respective 95% Confidence Intervals (CI) were calculated. Results: The prevalence of SAH was found to be 71.40%. In addition, hypertensive older women performed worse in the CST (P = 0.016), AC (P = 0.022) and TUG (P = 0.025) tests when compared to normotensive women. It was also observed that each additional repetition of the CST and AC tests attenuated the probability of SAH by 3% (PR: 0.97; 95%CI: 0.94-0.99); and that each additional second spent on the TUG increased the probability of the outcome by 2% (PR: 1.02; 95%CI: 1.01-1.03). Conclusion: It was found that the CST test and AC were negatively associated with hypertension, while the TUG showed a positive association with the outcome.