Assessment of cardiovascular disease risk factors and diabetes mellitus in Australian prisons: is the prisoner population unhealthier than the rest of the Australian population?

Cardiovascular Risk Factors Among Prisoners

“…Even after adjusting for factors such as smoking, alcohol, illicit drug use, and family income the latter association remained significant (AOR 1.6 [CI, 1.0Y2.6]; Wang et al, 2009). Relying on similar data using comparisons of prevalence estimates in two separate prisoner samples from 1996and 2001, D'Souza et al (2005 also found a statistically significant difference of a 3% higher prevalence for hypertension among prisoners in the 2001 group with a standardized morbidity ratio (SMR) of 1.7 (95% CI 1.39Y2.18). Compared with the general population, prisoners were found to have a higher odds of hypertension (OR jail 1.19, (95% CI 1.08Y1.31; OR prison 1.17, (CI 95% 1.09Y1.27).…”

“…Prisoner populations have a smoking prevalence that is up to three times that of the general populations with estimates ranging between 84 and 88% (Belcher et al, 2006;Hafizullah et al, 2010) and with 96% smoking rolled cigarettes (Richmond et al, 2011). A study by D'Souza et al (2005) pointed out a SMR of 0.89 (95% CI, 0.83Y0.96) in one prison sample. An Australian study (Belcher et al, 2006) found that the rate of smoking among prisoners was 1.5Y2.5 times higher than the equivalent groups within the community.…”

“…Compared with the general population, prisoners were found to have a higher odds of hypertension (OR jail 1.19, (95% CI 1.08Y1.31; OR prison 1.17, (CI 95% 1.09Y1.27). Furthermore, the data suggests that particular subgroups within prison samples are also at a significantly higher risk for incident hypertension, such as young offenders (AOR, 1.6 [95% CI, 1.0Y2.6; Wang et al, 2009), African American men (AOR, 1.9 [95% CI, 1.1Y3.5]); less educated people (Binswanger et al, 2009), Indigenous people (D'Souza et al, 2005), young women (OR 9.5 (95% CI, 3.3Y27.1; AOR, 9.1 [95% CI, 3.1Y26.3; p e 0.001) (Plugge et al, 2009). Thus, hypertension is an appropriate target for primary prevention efforts among at-risk prisoners, such as young offenders, and women prisoners, because such efforts have the potential of influencing the incidence and prevalence rates of several CVDs among them.…”

“…Some studies (D'Souza et al, 2005;Plugge et al, 2009) demonstrated that smoking among certain prison subgroups such as women (mean 85.3% [95% CI, 81.9Y88.1]) and Indigenous people (mean 82.3% [95% CI, 76.8Y87.0]) also indicated a higher smoking prevalence. In a UK based study with a female sample, Plugge et al (2009) indicated that Caucasian women younger than 30 years, those who left school aged 16 years or less, and those who were unemployed prior to imprisonment were all more likely to smoke.…”

Smoking in prisons: The need for effective and acceptable interventions

“…10 A significant decrease in smoking prevalence in prisoners occurred between 1996 and 2001 (from 88 per cent to 79 per cent). 11 As the majority of prisoners are men, prevalence rates are best compared to those of men in the general population of the same age. In Europe, adult (men and women) smoking prevalence has been estimated to be around 27 per cent (around 40 per cent in men and around 18 per cent in women).…”