Abstract:

Background: Stroke has become a problem of public health importance worldwide. Knowledge and practices related to stroke prevention among hypertensive patients are important in the control of the disease. In Tanzania, recent reports indicate an emerging epidemic of stroke. This study aimed to determine the knowledge on risk factors and complications of stroke among hypertensive patients at Bugando Medical Centre,Mwanza

Objective: Aim of study was to assess the knowledge on risk factors and complications of stroke among hypertensive patients attending medical outpatient clinic at Bugando Medical Centre.

Method: The study is descriptive cross-sectional study that involve hypertensive patients attending medical outpatient clinic at Bugando Medical Centre, Mwanza. Data analysis will be done by SPSS version 20.

Results: In this study, Total number of hypertensive patients involved in my study was 182, of which majority were aged more than 64 years (23.08%) and the minority were aged between 35- 40 years (8.24 %). Majority of hypertensive patients were male, and they were 57.69%, and the minority were female 42.31%. On education level, majority had a primary education, 59.34%, and the minority had college/ university education 8.24%. On occupational status, majority were unemployed, 67.03%, and the minority were employed 32.97%. From the study, the majority 60.44% said that they don’t know if there are any risk factors which may contributes to occurrence of stroke while 39.56% knew factors which may contributes to occurrence of stroke. Most of the mentioned risk factors were High blood pressure, High blood sugar, Cigarette smoking, HIV and Others (eg high lipid level, heart diseases and sickle cells diseases. This study showed that majority 75.27%) said that they don’t know the complications of stroke while 24.73% knew the complications of stroke. Most of the mentioned complications of were paralysis and speech difficult. Most of the mentioned complications of were paralysis and difficulty speech. Still the level of understanding of knowledge on risk factors and its complications is low among hypertensive patients at Mwanza Region. This is due to large population been primary school dropout and other are never went to school, hence it becomes difficult to access the importance of knowledge of stroke among hypertensive patients.