Master’s lecture MPH – Sara Lind Brynjólfsdóttir

Sara Lind Brynjólfsdóttir defends her MPH thesis in Public Health Sciences from the Department of Medicine:

"The association of sleep quality and physical activity on self-rated health of Icelanders. A cross-sectional study"

Thesis Supervisor is Jóhanna Eyrún Torfadóttir, Researcher at the Centre of Public Health Sciences. Supervisory teacher is Unnur A. Valdimarsdóttir, professor, Faculty of Medicine. Also on the master's committee is Hildur Guðný Ásgeirsdóttir, MPH.

Examiner is Sigríður Lára Guðmundsdóttir, Senior Lecturer, School of Education.

Abstract:

The aim of this study was to determine the associations of physical activity and sleep quality with self-rated health among 20-85 year old Icelanders. Moreover, this study aimed to observe whether the level of physical activity has an effect on self-rated health.

We used data from Saga cohort pilot study that was conducted at the University of Iceland in collaboration with the Icelandic Cancer Society in the Spring 2014. The number of participants in the present study was 842 and the gender ratio was 44% male to 56% female. Physical activity was divided into moderate and vigorous activity. Moderate activity is defined as physical activity that requires three to six times more energy than used at rest, and vigorous activity is defined as physical activity that requires more than six times more energy than used at rest. Sleep quality was measured with Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI). The outcome was self-rated health on a scale from 0 to 100, where 0 is the worst health. Those who rated their health at 50 points or less were considered to have poor self-rated health. We used binary logistic regression to calculate odds ratios (OR’s) and 95% confidence intervals (CI’s) of poor self-rated health by sleep quality and physical activity (moderate and vigorous). We adjusted for possible confounders like physical pain and body mass index.