Primary Health Care Visits Register (Avohilmo) as data source for monitoring the prevalence of overweight among men at enlistment age for military service

Background The aim of the study was to investigate the feasibility of utilizing THL’s Avohilmo register data for monitoring the prevalence of overweight among men at enlistment age for military service.

Methods Data for the study were collected from the Avohilmo register. All health care visits to the primary health care services from 1st January 2017 to 31st December 2017 of men born in 1999 were included. The recording rate for height and weight per municipality was calculated relative to the health care visits of men born in 1999.

Those municipalities of mainland Finland where the recording rate of height and weight data was at least 65% (N = 92, 31%) were included in the analyses of prevalence of overweight. The final data included 9756 men.

Results The recording rate of height and weight data varied between municipalities from 0% to 100%. Approximately one third of the municipalities (N = 92, 31%) had a recording rate of at least 65%, and almost half of the municipalities (N = 137, 46%) less than 10%.

In the 92 municipalities with a recording rate of at least 65%, 27% of men at enlistment age for military service were at least overweight, 9% obese and 3% severely obese in 2017.

Conclusions The Avohilmo register provides a potential tool for monitoring the prevalence of overweight among those population groups which participate in regularly organized health checkups covering the whole age group. However, the reliability of the record-keeping and the completeness of the data transfer from the local information systems to the national Avohilmo register must be improved.