Health literacy and factors related to blood pressure control among Kazakh and Han hypertension patients

Objective To compare the status of health literacy and related risk factors of blood pressure control between Kazakh and Han hypertension patients.Methods Totally 382 Kazakh and 374 Han hypertension patients were recruited in Urumqi and investigated with the High Blood Pressure Health Literacy Scale(HBP-HLS)and a physical examination.Results Among the Kazakh and Han patients,the average scores of health literacy were 29.57±11.63 and 64.57±23.6,and the proportions of the patients with adequate health literacy was 1.3% and 36.3%,respectively,with statistically significant differences(all P<0.05).The rates of target achievement for blood pressure control in the Kazakh and Han patients were 23.82% and 46.79%,with a significant difference(χ²=43.72,P=0.000).The systolic and diastolic blood pressure of the Kazakh patients aged 40 years or older were significantly higher than those of the Han patients of the same age groups(P<0.05).The results of multivariate unconditional logistic regression showed that the influence factors of blood pressure control in the Kazakh and Han patients were functional health literacy,body mass index(BMI),hypertensive complications,and education level.Conclusion Health literacy level was lower in Kazakh hypertension patients than in the Han patients; BMI and functional health literacy were factors related to target achievement of blood pressure control for the Kazakh hypertension patients and education level and complication of hypertension were the factors for the Han hypertension patients.