| Issue |
august-september, 2020 | The Health
23
NHMS 2019 HIGHLIGHTS
NON-COMMUNICABLE
DISEASES
Once they have completed collecting
the data, they spend about a month on
data cleaning before starting the analysis.
The Biostatistics and Data Repository unit
under the National Institute of Health
(NIH) supports them to run the analysis
and generate the results.
“The biostatistics unit will run the
analysis, whereby they will come out with
the results of what, where and whom with
the high and low prevalence.”
The next step is discussing the result
with the research team members, which
includes members from IPH, clinicians,
public health specialists, and university
experts. Then, it is presented to the
director of the IPH and later to the Deputy
Director-General of Health (Research &
Technical Support).
“We present to them first, for them
to view the result so that they are in
the know. It is then presented to the
Director-General of Health through the
NHMS Steering Committee,” he explained,
adding that the panel also includes all
the Deputy Director-Generals, heads
of department, local universities, state
directors and other representatives and
critical people in the health field.
“Once we get the Director-General’s
approval, the results are published and
sent to the ministry. We leave it to the
minister to announce them to the public.”
Disseminating the result
“Our main aim is not just to produce the
spike from the 13.4 per cent diabetes and
47.7 per cent obesity rate in 2015.
“What’s more alarming is we found that
diabetes is occurring at a younger age in
Malaysia. The number of Malaysians not
knowing they have diabetes is close to 48 per
cent,” said Dr Shubash Shander Ganapathy,
Medical Officer at the Institute for Public
Health (IPH).
results, but to also reach out to the public,”
Dr Shubash explained.
As such, the critical findings of NHMS
2019 are in the form of infographics. It
eases the message disseminated to the
public on what was found and the key
areas that people should take note.
“A lot of effort is taken to compress the
whole study to ensure the key points are
easily and quickly grasped.
“We did not want our data to be very
academic and purely for the MoH and
stakeholders. If it doesn’t reach the public,
things are not going to change.”
Other than the key findings, there
are also research highlights specially
prepared for each ministry and
stakeholder.
“The more technical research
highlights are created to hand out to the
relevant ministries and stakeholders.
The issues on health are not limited to
the MoH. We need other ministries and
multiple stakeholders to play their part.”
He added the highlights also included
recommendations by experts.
“We hope the survey will create
awareness and push people to take actions
preventing issues highlighted in the
survey from happening,” he said. — The
Health
The reports, infographics and fact sheets on
NHMS 2019, as well as the reports of previous
NHMS are all available in IPH’s website at
www.iku.gov.my/nhms
He added the younger age-group tend not
to screen themselves, so it goes undetected
for more extended periods, inviting
complications later.
The reports, infographics and fact sheets
on NHMS 2019, as well as the reports of
previous NHMS are all available in IPH’s
website at www.iku.gov.my/nhms
Diabetes among Adults
• Known diabetes: 9.4%
• Raised blood glucose among unknown
diabetes (Fasting blood glucose
7.0mmol/L): 8.9%
• Overall prevalence: 18.3%
An increase from 2011 (11.2%) and 2015
(13.4%), previous results reanalysed to
the new cut-off.
Hypertension among Adults
• Known hypertension: 15.9%
• Raised blood pressure among unknown
hypertension: 14.1%
• Overall prevalence: 30.0%
Plateau in the prevalence from 2011
(32.6%) and 2015 (30.3%).
Hypercholesterolemia among
Adults
• Known hypercholesterolemia: 13.5%
• Raised blood total cholesterol among
unknown hypercholesterolemia: 24.6%
• Overall prevalence: 38.1%
Changes seen from prevalence in 2011
(35.0%) and 2015 (47.7%).
Nutritional Status
• 50.1% of adults are overweight or obese
(30.4% overweight and 19.7% obese).
• 52.6% of adults have abdominal
obesity.
• Trends of overweight, obesity and
abdominal obesity continue to rise
compared to NHMS 2011 (29.4%,
15.1%, 45.4%) and 2015 (30.0%, 17.7%,
48.6%) findings.
• 29.8% of children 5 to 17 years of age
are overweight (15.0%) and obese
(14.8%).
• 21.8% of children under 5 years of age
are stunted. An increase from 2011
(16.6%) and 2015 (17.7%).
• 29.9% of women in reproductive age
are anaemic.
Others
• 25.1% of adults are physically inactive,
a reduction compared to 2011 (35.7%)
and 2015 (33.5%).
• 94.9% of adults do not consume the
recommended adequate fruits and /
vegetables of 5 servings per day. This is
a rise from the 92.5% in 2011 and 94.0%
in 2015.
• 21.3% of adults are current smokers,
while 11.8% are current alcohol drinkers.
The proportion of binge drinkers among
current drinkers are 45.8%. There is
a reduction of the proportion of binge
drinkers from 2011 (50.2%) and 2015
(59.4%).
• 2.3% of adults have depression,
while 7.9% of children 5 to 15 years
of age were found to have mental
health problems, mainly due to poor
interaction with their peers.
• 36.6% of adult women had done a pap
smear in the past 1 year. Among women
age 40 years and over, 21.0% had done
a mammogram in the past 3 years, while
25.0% had ever done a mammogram.
• 11.1% of adults and 4.7% of children
were found have disability.
Source: NHMS 2019 Fact Sheet