Comprehensive assessment of medical and social determinants of healthy lifestyle among servicemen of the Naval Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine

Abstract

The purpose is to comprehensively assess the medical and social determinants of a healthy lifestyle in the servicemen of the Navy of the Armed Forces of Ukraine to identify the most important risks and develop on this basis focused measures to reduce them.

Materials and methods. Medical and social aspects of fulfilling the requirements of a healthy lifestyle in servicemen of the Navy of the Armed Forces of Ukraine based on the results of a sociological survey using a specially designed questionnaire have been analyzed. The questionnaire included 43 requests, which were summarized in some information blocks. A questionnaire was used to conduct a questionnaire survey of 128 servicemen of the Navy servicemen who underwent an in-depth medical examination in 2019. The study group included males, average age - 38.5 ± 0.44, with 19.68 ± 0.43 years of service in the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Methods - bibliographic, medical and sociological, medical-statistical, system analysis.

Results. The article considers the medical and social aspects of meeting the requirements of a healthy lifestyle among servicemen of the Navy of the Armed Forces of Ukraine based on the results of a poll using a specially designed questionnaire. The questionnaire included information blocks: general information, awareness of a healthy lifestyle, prevalence and causes of bad habits, analysis of lifestyle (diet, physical activity, work and rest), self-assessment of health and a table for determining satisfaction with different aspects of life by the following criteria: working conditions and career prospects, housing and living conditions, family and material well-being, leisure and medical care, social and legal protection, etc.

Conclusions. It was established that typical factors that reduce the level of a healthy lifestyle among Navy servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine are violations of diet, work and rest, high levels of bad habits and insufficient level of physical activity. Despite the relatively high awareness of  Navy servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on the requirements of a healthy lifestyle, the implementation of these recommendations remains low, which raises the issue of forming a healthy lifestyle in the Armed Forces of Ukraine to the most relevant. There is a discrepancy between the high level of awareness of servicemen of the Navy of the Armed Forces of Ukraine about a healthy lifestyle and the practical implementation of these measures (98.1 ± 1.1% of respondents believe that they have enough knowledge about a healthy lifestyle, but most (56.0 ± 4.3%) these measures are performed incompletely due to the presence of bad habits (46.7 ± 4.3%) and financial difficulties (29.8 ± 4.0%). It is established that in order to improve the maintenance of a healthy lifestyle, according to a sociological survey, the introduction of material incentives for servicemen prevails over the use of administrative measures (77.0 ± 3.8% and 50.1 ± 4.4%, respectively). The most important problems concerning the living conditions of Navy servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine have been identified, namely: lack of housing, low level of material well-being and insufficient level of social and legal protection.