Level of physical activity of health professionals in a district hospital in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

Kunene, Siyabonga H.; Taukobong, N.P.

doi:10.4102/sajp.v71i1.234

Cited by 25 publications

(28 citation statements)

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“…Health professional whose ages less than 40 years were 3.5 times more likely to engage in physical activity compared with who aged ≥ 40 years. This result is in line with a study done in South Africa showed that Younger participants (< 40 years old) were found to be more active than older participants (≥40 years old) [35]. This can be explained by the fact that when age increases fatigability will also increase.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

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Level of physical activity and its correlates among health care workers in Ethiopia, 2019

Adane¹,

Gebregiorgis²,

Nigussie³

et al. 2019

Preprint

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Background These days, engaging at sufficient regular physical activity strongly recommended for good health and physical functioning. Physical activity can increase the self-confidence of the health professionals and they would become fit for daily activities with patients. Knowing the level of physical activity can help health care professionals to plan for physical activity programs. This study aimed to measure the level of physical activity and associated factors among adult health professionals at Tirunesh Beijing general hospital.Objective The aim of this study was to assess the level of physical activity and associated factors among health care workers in Ethiopia, 2019.Methods Institution based cross-sectional study conducted level of physical activity and associated factors among health care workers in Ethiopia, 2019. Two hundred nighty seven adult health professionals were participated, which was a 97.4% response rate. The global physical activity questionnaire used to measure the level of physical activity. Descriptive statistics and binary logistic regression analyses was done to affirm the variables characteristics. A predictor variable with a p-value of less than 0.2 exported to multivariate analysis. During multivariate analysis, statistical significance declared at a p-value of < 0.05.Results In general, the majority of the study participants, 89.2% (95% CI: 85.9-92.6) were achieved recommended levels of physical activity. Regarding the intensity of the physical activity, the overall mean time score was 518.4 mints per week or 2352.6 MET/week. For moderate-intensity physical activity, 83.5% of the study participants were physically active, (≥150 minutes/week). In the case of vigorous activity, about 32.7% of the study participants were physically active and engaged in vigorous physical activity (≥75 minutes /week). The study participants, who had self-motivation for physical activity, had a BMI of less than 25 kg/m2 and aged < 40 years were physically active.Conclusions Health care providers’ habit of physical activity improved as compared with the previous studies. However, the current level of physical activity of health professionals is not adequate. Health care providers’ age, body mass index and self-motivation attribute to physical activity. The level of physical activity can increase by enhancing staff motivation towards physical activity.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

“…Out of the Africa continent, the level of physical activity ranges from 27.5-82% [11][12][13][14]. In Africa, health care workers' physical activity ranges from 20.8-79.2% [15][16][17]. A study done in Addis Ababa showed that 73.7% of healthcare professionals as having a moderate level of physical activity.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Level of physical activity and its correlates among health care workers in Ethiopia, 2019

Adane¹,

Gebregiorgis²,

Nigussie³

et al. 2019

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Similar findings were observed in a study done by Kunene and Taukobong,[22] very few engaged in vigorous (23.9%) and moderate (37.6%) sport and moderate, fitness, or recreation physical activities.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

“…On the other hand, Kunene and Taukobong[22] found that nearly two-fifth (38.5%) engaged in vigorous and almost half (49.5%) in moderate work-related physical activities for at least 10 min continuously. It was observed that the mean number of days spent by the participants in the age group of 31–40 years were less when compared to other age groups.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Physical activity among dental health professionals in Hyderabad City: A questionnaire survey

et al. 2016

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Background:To assess and compare physical activity based on age, gender, marital status, education, and employment among dental health professionals in Hyderabad City, India.Materials and Methods:A cross-sectional questionnaire study was conducted among dentists and they were personally interviewed by a single trained interviewer. The frequency (in days) and time (in minutes) spent in doing vigorous- and moderate-intensity activity in a typical week in three domains and sedentary behavior were assessed using 16-item Global Physical Activity Questionnaire. Metabolic equivalents (METs) were used to express the intensity of physical activities.Results:Overall, 60.7% of the 313 respondents were physically active, with activity at work and commuting activity were the main contributors of physical activity. With increasing age, there was a decrease in physical activity with more sedentary behavior, professionals in age group of 21–30 years, who were single, those with Bachelor's Degree and those in teaching field performed activity at work, commuting, and recreational activity for more minutes with overall high MET minutes per week and least sedentary behavior.Conclusion:The prevalence of physical activity was high among dental health professionals.

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“…This result is in line with the findings of similar studies done elsewhere, worldwide, where doctors and other healthcare professionals were noted to be relatively inactive at work in a variety of disciplines. [4][5][6][7][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16] All the studies assessing doctors' physical activity levels while at work revealed that doctors fall into the so-called 'low active' category as classified by Tudor-Locke and Bassett, [8] i.e. daily activity ranging between 5 000 and 7 499 steps.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Let’s get physical: A prospective pedometer study of doctors working in a South African emergency department

2020

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Physical inactivity has been referred to as a pandemic and is the fourth leading contributing cause of mortality worldwide. [1] The positive impact of physical activity on health is well known, and lack thereof is known to increase the risk of several non-communicable diseases such as hypertension, coronary artery disease and type 2 diabetes. [1,2] This increased risk has local significance, as South Africans have been found to be among the least active people on the African continent. [3] South Africans' physical inactivity unfortunately extends to healthcare professionals. Kunene and Taukobong [4] evaluated the level of physical activity of a mixture of healthcare professionals at Estcourt Hospital, KwaZulu-Natal Province, South Africa (SA). Despite potentially having more insight into the risks of physical inactivity than patients, 69% of these healthcare professionals were found to have moderate to low physical activity levels. [4] This finding is echoed in the limited international research that has been published on the physical activity of doctors specifically. [5-7] The recommendation to walk at least 10 000 steps per day is seen as an appropriate activity target for healthy adults, and achieving this goal is a predictor of good health. [8] However, to date, none of the studies assessing doctors' physical activity levels at work have shown that they achieve this suggested target. [5-7,9-16] The emergency department (ED) is a fast-paced and busy working environment, and emergency medicine is regarded as one of the most stressful specialties in medicine. [17] It was therefore surprising that this shortfall in achieving 10 000 steps also applied to ED doctors. [9,10] Objectives To determine whether failure to achieve the above physical activity target also holds true in the SA context. We hypothesised that ED doctors would walk well over the 10 000-step mark because of our busy, overburdened and understaffed departments. [18] Our primary objective was to determine how many steps per shift were taken by doctors in an SA ED. The secondary objectives were to assess what factors influenced the number of steps taken. Methods Study design and setting We undertook a prospective observational cohort study over a 1-month period at a tertiary academic teaching hospital in Johannesburg. The ED sees ~65 000 patients per annum and has 2 500 m 2 of floor space. It includes a 7-bed resuscitation area, a 6-bed acute observation area, an 8-bed 'surgical' area and an 8-bed 'medical' area, as well as triage, orthopaedic, psychiatric and radiology sections. Ethics approval was obtained from the Human Research Ethics Committee of the University of the Witwatersrand (ref. no. M150405). Participants Medical officers (MOs) and emergency medicine registrars working various day shifts in the ED made up the study population. Written informed consent was obtained from each participant prior to enrolment in the study. This open-access article is distributed under Creative Commons licence CC-BY-NC 4.0.

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Level of physical activity of health professionals in a district hospital in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

Cited by 25 publications

References 25 publications

Level of physical activity and its correlates among health care workers in Ethiopia, 2019

Level of physical activity and its correlates among health care workers in Ethiopia, 2019

Physical activity among dental health professionals in Hyderabad City: A questionnaire survey

Let’s get physical: A prospective pedometer study of doctors working in a South African emergency department

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