Association between Participation in Annual Physical Examinations and Risk Factors for Noncommunicable Diseases in Adults with Disabilities: Evidence from Shanghai, China

Abstract

The relationships between regular participation in annual physical examinations and the risk factors for noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) among adults with disabilities remains unclear. To address this gap, we used data from 130,899 individuals with disabilities in Shanghai (2014–2016) and evaluated four risk factors for NCDs: hypertension, hyperglycemia, hyperlipidemia, and being overweight. Overall, 4540 individuals participated in annual physical examinations across all three years and 11,388 missed examinations in 2015 (group without regular participation). Chi-squared tests and binary logistic regression were used to assess differences in patient characteristics and explore correlations between variables. Significant differences in age (χ2 = 102.620, p < 0.01), place of residence (χ2 = 94.308, p < 0.01), educational level (χ2 = 59.884, p < 0.01), marital status (χ2 = 16.414, p < 0.01) and disability type (χ2 = 56.499, p < 0.01) and severity (χ2 = 45.464, p < 0.01) were found between those who participated in regular physical examinations and those who did not. Regular participation was associated with reduced incidences of hypertension (odds ratio 0.799, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.733–0.871) and hyperlipidemia (0.347, 95% CI: 0.307–0.392), but not with the incidence of diabetes (1.049, 95% CI: 0.944–1.166) or being overweight (0.907, 95% CI: 0.812–1.014). Hence, regular participation in annual physical examinations had different associations with risk factors for NCDs.