Prevalence of Tobacco and Alcohol Consumption and its Association with Incident Hypertension among Young Adults Residing in an Urban Area of West Bengal.

Background: This study was conducted to estimate the prevalence of tobacco and alcohol use among young adults and also to evaluate their association with incident hypertension in an urban area of West Bengal, India. Materials and Methods: About 330 young adults (20-39 years of age) residing in an urban area for more than 6 months were interviewed by the consecutive sampling method with a semistructured interview schedule. Weight, height, and blood pressure of all the study participants were measured using standard procedures. Continuous variables were expressed as mean (±SD) and categorical variables as proportions. The Chi-square test and bivariate and multivariate logistic regression were performed to estimate the association between select variables and incident hypertension. Results: In this study, prevalence of tobacco and alcohol consumption was 50.9% (95% CI: 45.5-56.3) and 46.4% (95% CI: 41.0-51.8), respectively. About 14.4% of participants were found to have incident hypertension (95% CI: 10.5-18.2). Statistically significant association of use of either tobacco or alcohol was found with incident hypertension in the present study (odds ratio: 2.57, 95% CI: 1.04-6.34, Conclusion: This study suggests that young adults who are alcohol and tobacco users are at an increased risk of developing incident hypertension. Hence, awareness generation and early screening measures at the national level should be implemented for prevention of noncommunicable diseases among young adults.