Abstract

Background: Health behavior is almost about people’s own attitudes and habits, to resist or  accept  diseases.  Social  as  well  as  behavioral  change  in  public  health  known  as  social  and behavior change communication (SBCC). Continuous efforts kept focusing on disease prevention  to  save  costs  at  health  care.  This  is  particularly  important  in  low  and  middle-income countries, where health interventions have come under increased scrutiny because of the cost.

Objectives:  To  study  the  epidemiological  transition  in  health  behavior  among  adults  emirate living in Dubai 2009-2019.

Methodology: Secondary  data  of  three  success  house  hold  health  surveys  carried  out  in  Dubai(2009,  2014.2019)  in  cooperation  between  Dubai  Health  authority  and  Dubai  statistics center, sampling, survey design, data collection, data weighting and data analysis has  been  carried  out  based  on  advanced  statistical  and  epidemiological  applications  to  ensure the validity and reliability of the survey outcomes.

Results:  The  present  study  showed  that  obesity  among  adults  Emirati  living  in  Dubai  2009  was  24%  while  in  2019  was  39.9%,  adequate  intake  of  fruits  &  vegetable  in  the  same groups 2009 was 53.8% and 47% in 2014 while 36.1% in 2019. As for tobacco use, the  current  study  revealed  that  8.6%  in  2009,  7.2%  in  2014  and  14.3%  in  2019.  As  for  physical activity the result showed that physical active adult emirate living in Dubai 2009 was 19.3%, 2014 13% and 2019 23%. There were clear difference between 2009 and 2019 prevalence of behavioral risks be from 8.6% to 14.3% in tobacco use, 19.3% to 23.6% for physical activity and from 24% to 9.9% in obesity, while adequate consumption of fruits and  vegetables  dropped  down  from  53.8%  to  36.1%.  In  regards  to  diabetes  mellitus  the  current  study  revealed  that  prevalence  of  diabetes  among  adult  emirate  living  in  Dubai  increased from 13.1% to 19.3 from 2009 to 2019 and prevalence of hypertension increased from 16.9% to 23.20%.

Conclusions:  The  study  concluded  that  most  of  the  health  behavior  risks  enrolled  in  the  current study(Tobacco use, obesity, physical activity, consumption of fruits and vegetables, hypertension  and  diabetes)  showed  clear  deterioration  and  stepped  down  to  non-healthy  attitude, practice and approaching among adults emirate living in Dubai during the last 10 years from now.

Keywords

health styles, outcomes, Dubai