Work, work-life conflict and health in an industrial work environment.

BACKGROUND: Work-life conflict has been poorly studied as a cause of ill-health in occupational medicine. AIMS: To study associations between physical and psychosocial working conditions, including work-life conflict on the one hand and general, physical and mental health outcomes on the other. METHODS: Cross-sectional data were used from an employee survey among the workforces of four medium-sized and large companies in Switzerland. Physical work factors included five demands and exposures such as heavy loads, repetitive work and poor posture. Psychosocial factors included 14 demands and limited resources such as time pressure, overtime, monotonous work, job insecurity, low job autonomy, low social support and work-life conflict. Health outcomes studied were self-rated health, sickness absence, musculoskeletal disorders, sleep disorders, stress and burnout. RESULTS: There was a response rate of 49%; 2014 employees participated. All adverse working conditions were positively associated with several poor health outcomes in both men and women. After mutual adjustment for all work factors and additional covariates, only a few, mainly psychosocial work factors remained significant as risk factors for health. Work-life conflict, a largely neglected work-related psychosocial factor in occupational medicine, turned out to be the only factor that was significantly and strongly associated with all studied health outcomes and was consistently found to be the strongest or second strongest of all the studied risk factors. CONCLUSIONS: Even in an industrial work environment, psychosocial work factors, and particularly work-life conflict, play a key role and need to be taken into consideration in research and workplace health promotion.

Correlates of short- and long-term absence due to musculoskeletal disorders.

BACKGROUND: Musculoskeletal disorders (MSD) are a common cause of disability and absence from work. There is no consistent evidence in the literature regarding predictors for short- and long-term absences due to these disorders. AIMS: To investigate work-related factors influencing short- and long-term absences due to MSD in German-speaking countries. METHODS: The study is based on data from the Fourth European Working Conditions Survey. The study population included 2849 workers in German-speaking countries who participated in face-to-face interviews. Logistic regression models were used to determine the associations between possible risk factors and the occurrence of short- or long-term absence due to MSD. RESULTS: A tiring or painful working position was positively correlated with short- and long-term absenteeism due to MSD, whereas the freedom to decide when to take holidays was negatively associated with this phenomenon. Some psychosocial factors, such as the ability to apply one's own ideas at work, the ability to choose or change the speed or rate of work and the emotional demands of the job, had contradictory impacts on short- and long-term absenteeism due to MSD. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this investigation show that it is important to distinguish between predictors of short- and long-term absenteeism due to MSD.

[Work stress, health and satisfaction of life in young doctors. Results of a longitudinal study in Switzerland]. / Arbeitsstress, Gesundheit und Lebenszufriedenheit junger Arztinnen und Arzte. Ergebnisse einer Schweizer Longitudinalstudie.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Based on the Effort-Reward-Imbalance Model by Siegrist a study was undertaken to find out (a) in what way young doctors assess effort and reward during their specialist training; (b) whether there are certain job stress patterns over time; and (c) what the correlations are, if any, between perceived job stress, health and satisfaction with life. METHODS: Within the framework of a prospective study (2001 - 2007) 370 doctors who had just qualified and were residents in the German-speaking part of Switzerland were assessed four times by means of anonymized questionnaires. Job stress, measured by the Effort-Reward-Imbalance scale, as well as health and satisfaction with life were assessed in these doctors' 2nd (T2), 4th (T3), and 6th (T4) year of specialist training ("residents"). Stress patterns of the participants were evaluated, based on the effort and reward scale values at T2, T3, and T4, by two-step cluster analysis. Gender differences between the clusters were calculated by the 2 test and differences in the continuous variables by analysis of variance with repeated measurements. RESULTS: During residency the percentage of doctors who experienced an Effort-Reward-Imbalance (ratio between effort and reward ERI > 1) increased from 18% at T2 to 20 % at T3 to 25 % at T4. The cluster analysis revealed two clusters: Type 1 (67%) with effort values below average and reward values above average (ER balance) across the three measurement points, and type 2 (33 %) with effort values above average and reward values below average (ER imbalance). Subjects in cluster 2 showed unfavorable values, when compared with those in cluster 1, in overcommitment, in workload and in the health variables (anxiety, depression, physical and psychological well-being), as well as in their assessed satisfaction with life at all three measurement points. CONCLUSIONS: One third of the doctors experienced stress at work, caused by an effort-reward imbalance. This had a negative impact on their health and satisfaction with life. Regular supervision and goal-oriented career counselling provided by senior physicians could contribute to young doctors not feeling so much stressed at work, feeling well and being more content with their work.