the association of life style with hypertension in korean women

background: this study examined the relationship between lifestyle factors and hypertension in korean women. methods: the subjects were 8,836 women, aged 20 to 81 yr, who visited a health promotion center for a medical check up during 2004-2008. the diagnosis of hypertension was defined in the joint national committee on prevention, detection, evaluation, and treatment of high blood pressure (jnc7) report. statistical significance was set at α<0.05 and spss ver. 12.0 software (spss, chicago, il, usa) was used. results: the prevalence of hypertension was 12.8% in this study population. multivariate logistic regression demonstrated that the odds ratio (95% ci) of hypertension across age groups were 3.43 (1.68-7.02) for forties, 7.13 (3.48-14.60) for fifties, 12.97 (6.27-26.81) for sixties, and 24.28 (11.09-53.14) for over seventies compared to the twenties. in addition, compared with the normal weight group, the odds ratio (95% ci) of hypertension in the over-weight and obese groups were 2.41 (2.00-2.89) and 3.50 (2.95-4.16), respectively. the odds ratio (95% ci) of hypertension in those who consumed more than 3 drinks per week was 1.88 (1.29-2.76, p =0.001) compared with non-drinking group. conclusion: the significant risk factors of hypertension were age, bmi, and alcohol drinking among korean women and that smoking, exercise, and diet were not related to the risk of hypertension.