Relationships of job burnout and depressive symptoms with work-related musculoskeletal disorders in coal miners in Xinjiang / 环境与职业医学

ABSTRACT

Background Work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WMSDs) is one of the main disorders that impair the working ability of workers. Social and psychological factors can lead to WMSDs by affecting physiological mechanisms, changing work posture, or disturbing mood and cognitive ability. Objective To explore current situation of job burnout, depressive symptoms, and WMSDs in coal miners, and to analyze their relationships. Methods This cross-sectional survey adopted cluster random sampling method and selected 1700 on-job coal miners from five coal mining enterprises in Xinjiang. The general information, job burnout, depressive symptoms, and the prevalence of WMSDs in coal miners were investigated by using the Job Burnout Scale, Self-rating Depressive Symptom Scale, and Chinese Musculoskeletal Questionnaire. The prevalence rates of WMSDs, job burnout scores, and depressive symptom scores of coal miners with different demographic characteristics were compared. Spearman correlation analysis was used to identify the correlations among the three variables. A structural equation model was established to the analyze the potential mediating effect of depressive symptoms on the relationship between job burnout and WMSDs. Results A total of 1528 valid questionnaires were collected, with an valid recovery rate of 89.9%, including 1335 males (87.4%) and 193 females (12.6%). The M (P0-P100) of age was 41 (19-59) years, and the M (P0-P100) of length of service was 25 (1-42) years. The prevalence rate of WMSDs in coal miners was 57.7%. The M (P25, P75) score of job burnout was 54.0 (45.0, 61.0), and the M (P25, P75) score of depressive symptoms was 48.8 (43.8, 53.8). There were significant differences in WMSDs prevalence rate, job burnout score, and depressive symptom score among different sex, age, length of service, shift, and education level groups (P<0.05). There was a positive correlation between job burnout and WMSDs and between depressive symptoms and WMSDs (rs=0.172 and 0.098, P < 0.01), and there was a positive correlation between job burnout and depressive symptoms (rs=0.138, P < 0.01). The results of structural equation model suggested that job burnout and depressive symptoms directly affected WMSDs, and the standardized path coefficients (β) were 0.10 and 0.09, respectively; job burnout also directly affected depressive symptoms (β=0.19). The total effect of job burnout on WMSDs was 0.120, the direct effect was 0.102, and the indirect effect mediated by depressive symptoms was 0.018, accounting for 15.0% of the total effect (all Ps<0.05). Conclusion The prevalence rate of WMSDs in coal miners is high, and job burnout and depressive symptoms are associated with WMSDs.