Volunteering and hypertension risk in later life.

OBJECTIVE

This study examined the relationship between volunteer activity and hypertension, a risk factor for cardiovascular disease, renal failure, and cognitive impairment.

METHOD

Employing data from the Health and Retirement Study, we estimated regression models of hypertension status that include volunteer activity and psychosocial and health behavior risk factors for middle-aged and older persons.

RESULTS

Multivariate analyses showed volunteers had lower hypertension risk and lower systolic and diastolic blood pressure than nonvolunteers and that a threshold effect was present, whereby a modest amount of volunteer time commitment (but not a high amount) was associated with lower risk of hypertension. We did neither find support that psychosocial and health behaviors mediated this relationship nor find support for a moderating effect of volunteering for the relationships among health behaviors and hypertension.

DISCUSSION

The results of this study indicate that research is needed to determine what mediates the relationship between volunteering and hypertension.