Vol. 16 No. 1 (2025)
Original Articles

Morbidity Profile of Sedentary Workers in a Food Packaging Industry in Goa: A Retrospective Record-Based Study

PDF
  • Nadia Claire Mascarenhas e Dias,
  • Jagadish A Cacodcar
Nadia Claire Mascarenhas e Dias
Postgraduate Student, Department of Community Medicine, Goa Medical College, Bambolim, Goa, India
Jagadish A Cacodcar
Professor and HoD, Department of Community Medicine, Goa Medical College, Bambolim, Goa, India
Categories

Published 31-03-2025

Keywords

  • Food packaging industry,
  • Goa,
  • Morbidity,
  • Sedentary workers

Copyright (c) 2025 Nadia Claire Mascarenhas e Dias, Jagadish A Cacodcar (Author)

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

How to Cite

1.
Mascarenhas e Dias NC, Cacodcar JA. Morbidity Profile of Sedentary Workers in a Food Packaging Industry in Goa: A Retrospective Record-Based Study. Healthline. 2025;16(1):29-34. doi:10.51957/Healthline_691_2025

Abstract

Introduction: With the advent of mechanization and technological advancement, there is an increase in sedentary and light intensity nature of work in the food manufacturing industry. Objective: To describe the morbidity profile of sedentary workers and factors associated with it in a food packaging industry in Goa. Method: A retrospective record-based study was conducted for a period of 3 months on 523 workers from food packaging industry in North Goa who are registered with an Occupational Health Service. Morbid conditions such as common chronic diseases like Diabetes, Hypertension, Visual and auditory problems were studied. Continuous data with normal distribution were expressed as mean and standard deviation. Morbidity profile was depicted as frequency and percentage and association with appropriate statistical test. Results: Majority, i.e. 495 workers (94.6%) did not have any co-morbidity, 17 (3.3%) had hypertension, 7 (1.3%) had diabetes and 4 (0.8%) had both diabetes and hypertension. Age ≥30 years (p=0.000), presence of comorbidities (p=0.011), near vision (p=0.000), total vision (p=0.031) and blood pressure (p=0.002) were significantly associated with being overweight or obese. A low positive correlation was observed between Body Mass Index and systolic blood pressure (r=0.232, p=0.000), diastolic blood pressure (r=0.166, p=0.000) and Random Blood Sugar Level (r=0.089, p=0.042). Conclusion: Workers from the food packaging industry suffer from diabetes, hypertension and overweight, which are known to progress with prolonged periods of reduced physical activity as seen at their workplace.

PDF

References

  1. 1. Park JH, Moon JH, Kim HJ, Kong MH, Oh YH. Sedentary Lifestyle: Overview of Updated Evidence of Potential Health Risks. Korean J Fam Med. 2020 Nov;41(6):365–73.
  2. 2. Hamilton MT, Hamilton DG, Zderic TW. Role of low energy expenditure and sitting in obesity, metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. Diabetes. 2007 Nov;56(11):2655–67.
  3. 3. Physical inactivity a leading cause of disease and disability, warns WHO [Internet]. [cited 2025 Mar 18]. Available from: https://www.who.int/news/item/04-04-2002-physical-inactivity-a-leading-cause-of-disease-and-disability-warns-who
  4. 4. American College of Cardiology. Available from: https://www.acc.org/latest-in-cardiology/articles/2017/11/08/11/47/mon-5pm-bp-guideline-aha-2017
  5. 5. American Diabetes Association. Available from https://diabetes.org/diabetes/a1c/diagnosis#:~:text=Diabetes%20is%20diagnosed%20at%20two,equal%20to%20200%20mg%2Fdl. Accessed on 6th September 2022.
  6. 6. Misra A, Chowbey P, Makkar BM, Vikram NK, Wasir JS, Chadha D, Joshi SR, Sadikot S, Gupta R, Gulati S, Munjal YP; Concensus Group. Consensus statement for diagnosis of obesity, abdominal obesity and the metabolic syndrome for Asian Indians and recommendations for physical activity, medical and surgical management. J Assoc Physicians India. 2009 Feb;57:163-70. PMID: 19582986.
  7. 7. WHO grades for hearing impairment. Available from: https://ec.europa.eu/health/scientific_committees/opinions_layman/en/hearing-loss-personal-music-player-mp3/figtableboxes/table-4.htm Accessed on 6th September 2022.
  8. 8. National Health Portal of India. Accessed from: https://www.nhp.gov.in/disease/blood-lymphatic/iron-deficiency-anemia on 6th September 2022.
  9. 9. Mhalshekar VK, Kunkolienkar RP, Naik SD, Rodrigues EJ, Chauhan PS, Cacodcar JA. A study of morbidities among electronic equipment manufacturing workers in Goa. Int J Community Med Public Health 2021;8:3871-5.
  10. 10. Lokhande VR. Health profile of workers in a ship building and repair industry. Indian J Occup Environ Med 2014;18:89-94.
  11. 11. Kazi, A., Haslam, C., Duncan, M., Clemes, S. and Twumasi, R., 2018. Sedentary behaviour and health at work: an investigation of industrial sector, job role, gender and geographical differences. Ergonomics, 62(1), pp.21-30.
  12. 12. Suri S, Das R. Occupational health profile of workers employed in the manufacturing sector of India. Natl Med J India. 2016 Sep-Oct;29(5):277-281.
  13. 13. Kalyani S, Bicholkar AU, Cacodcar JA et al. Morbidities among Shipbuilding Workers in Goa: A Retrospective Record-Based Study. Epidem Int 2019; 4(2) 23-28.
  14. 14. Liu N, Birstler J, Venkatesh M, Hanrahan L, Chen G, Funk L. Obesity and BMI Cut Points for Associated Comorbidities: Electronic Health Record Study. J Med Internet Res. 2021 Aug 9;23(8):e24017.
  15. 15. Pantalone KM, Hobbs TM, Chagin KM, Kong SX, Wells BJ, Kattan MW, Bouchard J, Sakurada B, Milinovich A, Weng W, Bauman J, Misra-Hebert AD, Zimmerman RS, Burguera B. Prevalence and recognition of obesity and its associated comorbidities: cross-sectional analysis of electronic health record data from a large US integrated health system. BMJ Open. 2017 Nov 16;7(11):e017583.
  16. 16. Qu Y, Huang H, Zhang H. Association between body mass index and myopia in the United States population in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys 1999 to 2008: a cross-sectional study. European Journal of Medical Research. 2023 Dec 5;28(1):561.
  17. 17. Noh YH, Jung KI. The Relationship between Myopia and Obesity in Adults. Korean J Ophthalmol. 2024 Apr;38(2):137-146.
  18. 18. Song L, Li J, Yu S, Cai Y, He H, Lun J, et al. Body Mass Index is Associated with blood pressure and vital capacity in medical students. Lipids in Health and Disease. 2023 Oct 18;22(1):174.
  19. 19. Mungreiphy NK, Kapoor S, Sinha R. Association between BMI, Blood Pressure, and Age: Study among Tangkhul Naga Tribal Males of Northeast India. Journal of Anthropology. 2011;2011(1):748147.