Prevalence of coronary heart disease risk factors in physical education students

Abstract To establish the prevalence of coronary risk in physical education students, and compare risk between the genders and the years of course. We evaluated 246 physical education students using RISKO questionnaire to determine eight risk factors: age, heredity, body weight, smoking, physical inactivity, hypercholesterolemia, hypertension and sex. Students had mean coronary risk score of 16.03 ± 3.52 points, rated "below-average risk." Men had significantly greater risk compared to women. No difference was found between the years of course. The prevalence of risk factors were heritability (58.37%), physical inactivity (32.65%), hypercholesterolemia (32.24%), overweight (27.35%), smoking (3.67%) and hypertension (2.45%). The coronary risk of physical education students was rated as below average, being higher among men than women, and no difference in risk between years of course. The most prevalent risk factors were heredity, physical inactivity, overweight and hypercholesterolemia.