Abstract

Author(s): Fernández Carrasco, María del Pilar; López Ortiz, María Montserrat

Introduction: In Mexico, diabetes mellitus was the second leading cause of death and first among the population over 20 years. Obesity and overweight significantly increase the risk of noncommunicable diseases, such as diabetes. The eating habits (HA) to be behaviors acquired by individuals through repetition of acts related to food, become relevant for their analysis in university students, who occasionally enter into unhealthy eating practices that can have an effect on their health.

Objective: Identify the relationship between eating habits and risk of developing diabetes in Mexican university students in the health area.

Methods: Observational, analytical and cross-sectional study in university students of six academic programs of health sciences. The information was obtained through the Food Habits questionnaire, the Finnish Diabetes Risk Score (FINDRISC) and a general data questionnaire. For statistical analysis used descriptive statistics and analysis of variance.

Results: 137 university students participated, 32.8% men and 67.2% women, average age 20.63 + 1.73 years. According to the body mass index (BMI), 72.3% had normal weight. 70.8% of participants had low risk to develop diabetes. A significant relationship was identified between eating habits in the factors “knowledge and control” (p <0.001), “caloric content” (p <0.001) and “type of food” (p = 0.04) and the risk of developing diabetes, finding the higher score for moderate risk in all three factors.

Discussion: Several factors such as not eating food between meals, caloric content, consumption of low calories snacks, among others, are involved in the development of eating habits of university students, some with a greater relationship to reduce the risk of diabetes.

Conclusions: In this study, knowledge and control, caloric content and type of food are the factors most related to the low to moderate risk of developing diabetes.