Qualidade de áreas verdes na cidade de Uberlândia e sua relação com hipertensão arterial sistêmica (HAS)

Abstract

Systemic Arterial Hypertension (SAH) is a chronic health condition with no cure, characterized by high blood pressure levels in the arteries. The disease is multifactorial, with several risk factors for its development. The interest of the research lies in the green areas accessible to the population, known as Open Public Spaces (OPS), to understand whether this aspect can be considered an environmental and social determinant of health, since previous studies have shown an association with afforestation. We sought to analyze whether there is a relationship between the presence of Open Public Spaces such as Squares and Parks and the prevalence of Systemic Arterial Hypertension in the city of Uberlândia, obtaining the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index through satellite images and selecting areas with many and few hypertensive individuals, analyzing their Open Public Spaces, in quantity and quality. The four Health Units selected with the lowest hypertension rates presented, in 50% of the sample, only 1 square/park, and in the other 50%, no square/park. The health Units with the highest rates of hypertension presented, in all cases, at least 1 OPS, with 50% of the sample presenting more than 10 OPS and in the other 50% their quality was classified as “excellent”. Open Public Spaces do not seem to influence the health of the population when we talk about hypertension, as their Pearson correlation was 0.80 for quantity and 0.64 for quality, but afforestation does, since its Pearson correlation was -0.15.