Vol. 11, Special Issue 10 (2022)

This cross-sectional study investigates the impact of socio-demographics on health status, awareness and prevalence of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) among Gujjar and Bakerwal tribes in Kashmir. Multistage cluster sampling using probability proportion to size was adopted and 6808 respondents were enrolled with a mean age of 37 years. A structured data collection form was used and a p-value ≤0.05 was considered as statistically significant. Of the total 2872 males and 3936 females, 53.6% and 69.6% of subjects respectively, were found to be illiterate. The annual income of households was around Rs.25000. Around 862 (33.8%) male and 1016 (28.5%) female subjects were malnourished. Further, the study revealed only 7.9%, 9% and 11% of the subjects were aware of thyroid dysfunction/dyslipidemia, diabetes and heart diseases respectively whereas hypertension was known to 39.3% of the subjects. The awareness regarding the family history of NCDs was scarce. Appropriate nutritional intervention, NCD awareness, and educational policies are warranted to improve their health status, literacy rates and per-capita income.