Chronic health conditions and work-related stress in older adults participating in the Dutch workforce (original) (raw)
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BMC public health, 2014
People spend a considerable amount of time at work over the course of their lives, which makes the workplace important to health and aging. However, little is known about the potential long-term effects of work-related stress on late-life health. This study aims to examine work-related stress in late midlife and educational attainment in relation to serious health problems in old age. Data from nationally representative Swedish surveys were used in the analyses (n = 1,502). Follow-up time was 20-24 years. Logistic regressions were used to examine work-related stress (self-reported job demands, job control, and job strain) in relation to serious health problems measured as none, serious problems in one health domain, and serious problems in two or three health domains (complex health problems). While not all results were statistically significant, high job demands were associated with higher odds of serious health problems among women but lower odds of serious health problems among m...
Work-related stress symptoms of aging employees in municipal occupations
PubMed, 1991
The objective of the study was to investigate the relationship between stress symptoms and work stressors among aging employees in municipal occupations. The subjects were 1799 men and 2456 women aged 48-62 years and representing 40 different occupations. Stress reactions were identified on the basis of long-term cardiorespiratory, musculoskeletal, and psychological symptoms. Work stressors were described by means of physical and mental work demands. Two factors describing the possibilities for regulating one's own work load were used as indicators for the adjustment of work according to individual capacities. The effect of work stressors on cardiovascular, musculoskeletal, and psychological symptoms was studied in separate analyses, controlling for the relevant disease group. Both chronic diseases and work stressors were related to the occurrence of symptoms. However, stress identified on the basis of symptoms was not only a phenomenon determined by health status. Work stressors and possibilities for regulating one's own work load were systematically related to symptom level.
Stress-related Health Symptoms and Working Environment of Older Employees in Lithuania
Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2015
The paper identifies stress-related health symptoms and work environment characteristics that older employees face in Lithuania. The data set consisted of 119 respondents of 50 years and older. Health symptoms were evaluated using 20 items derived from the Bristol stress and health work study (Smith et al., 2000). The work environment characteristics were measured using 10 scales from the Short Inventory to Monitor Psychosocial Hazards (Notelaers et al., 2007). The most prevalent health symptoms were backache, difficulty sleeping, heartburn, feeling of tiredness, etc. Respondents often had good relationships with colleagues and supervisor, and often experienced job variety and clarity. However, they had fewer opportunities to learn, lower independence at work and could rarely participate in decision making.
Effect of retirement on major chronic conditions and fatigue: French GAZEL occupational cohort study
BMJ: British Medical …, 2010
Objectives To determine, using longitudinal analyses, if retirement is followed by a change in the risk of incident chronic diseases, depressive symptoms, and fatigue.Design Prospective study with repeat measures from 7 years before to 7 years after retirement.Setting Large French occupational cohort (the GAZEL study), 1989-2007.Participants 11246 men and 2858 women.Main outcome measures Respiratory disease, diabetes, coronary heart disease and stroke, mental fatigue, and physical fatigue, measured annually by self report over the 15 year observation period; depressive symptoms measured at four time points.Results The average number of repeat measurements per participant was 12.1. Repeated measures logistic regression with generalised estimating equations showed that the cumulative prevalence of self reported respiratory disease, diabetes, and coronary heart disease and stroke increased with age, with no break in the trend around retirement. In contrast, retirement was associated with a substantial decrease in the prevalence of both mental fatigue (odds ratio for fatigue one year after versus one year before retirement 0.19, 95% confidence interval 0.18 to 0.21) and physical fatigue (0.27, 0.26 to 0.30). A major decrease was also observed in depressive symptoms (0.60, 0.53 to 0.67). The decrease in fatigue around retirement was more pronounced among people with a chronic disease before retirement.Conclusions Longitudinal modelling of repeat data showed that retirement did not change the risk of major chronic diseases but was associated with a substantial reduction in mental and physical fatigue and depressive symptoms, particularly among people with chronic diseases.
Age (Dordrecht, Netherlands), 2014
The aim of this study is to investigate whether work-related stress symptoms in midlife are associated with a number of mobility limitations during three decades from midlife to late life. Data for the study come from the Finnish Longitudinal Study of Municipal Employees (FLAME). The study includes a total of 5429 public sector employees aged 44-58 years at baseline who had information available on work-related stress symptoms in 1981 and 1985 and mobility limitation score during the subsequent 28-year follow-up. Four midlife work-related stress profiles were identified: negative reactions to work and depressiveness, perceived decrease in cognition, sleep disturbances, and somatic symptoms. People with a high number of stress symptoms in 1981 and 1985 were categorized as having constant stress. The number of self-reported mobility limitations was computed based on an eight-item list of mobility tasks presented to the participants in 1992, 1997, and 2009. Data were analyzed using joi...
Work-related health in Europe: Are older workers more at risk?
Are Older Workers More at Risk? * This paper uses the fourth European Working Conditions Survey (2005) to address the impact of age on work-related self-reported health outcomes. More specifically, the paper examines whether older workers differ significantly from younger workers regarding their jobrelated health risk perception, mental and physical health, sickness absence, probability of reporting injury and fatigue. Accounting for the 'healthy worker effect', or sample selectionin so far as unhealthy workers are likely to exit the labour force -we find that as a group, those aged 55-65 years are more 'vulnerable' than younger workers: they are more likely to perceive work-related health and safety risks, and to report mental, physical and fatigue health problems. As previously shown, older workers are more likely to report work-related absence.
Scientific Reports, 2017
Work stress is a risk factor for cardio-metabolic diseases, but few large-scale studies have examined the clinical profile of individuals with work stress. To address this limitation, we conducted a crosssectional study including 43,593 working adults from a French population-based sample aged 18-72 years (the CONSTANCES cohort). According to the Effort-Reward Imbalance model, work stress was defined as an imbalance between perceived high efforts and low rewards at work. A standardized health examination included measures of anthropometry, lung function, blood pressure and standard blood-based biomarkers. Linear regression analyses before and after multivariable adjustment for age, socioeconomic status, depressive symptoms, health-related behaviours, and chronic conditions showed that work stress was associated with higher BMI, waist circumference, waist-hip ratio, alanine transaminase, white blood cell count and lower high-density lipoprotein cholesterol in men, and with higher BMI and white blood cell count in women (differences 0.03-0.06 standard deviations, P < 0.05 between individuals with and without work stress). No robust associations were observed with lung function, haemoglobin, creatinine, glucose levels or resting blood pressure measures. This indicates that work stress is associated altered metabolic profile, increased systemic inflammation, and, in men, poorer liver function, which is a marker of high alcohol consumption. Research on stress and cardiovascular disease has a long history. At the beginning of the 20th century, Sir William Osler, the "father" of modern medicine, suggested that a major cause of myocardial infarction was the "wear and tear of life" 1. Systematic research on stress at work began in the late 1970s and early 1980s when Robert Karasek launched the Demand-control model postulating that work stress results from a combination of high psychological job demands and low job control 2-4. More recent work stress theories have broadened the concept beyond these proximal job task characteristics to embrace organizational factors, labour market arrangements, and personal characteristics 5. The Effort-reward imbalance model, for example, proposes that an imbalance between high efforts and low reward at work is a common source of work-related stress 6. High efforts may originate from high demands or obligations at work, but also from a personal motivational pattern characterised by a very high commitment to work. Low rewards, in return, can include material (e.g. low salary), social (e.g. poor job security, few promotion prospects) and psychological aspects (e.g. low appreciation, lack of positive feedback). The
the authors examined the independent role of perceived job stress on the short-term incidence of clinical manifest coronary events in a large occupational cohort. A total of 14,337 middle-aged men completed the Job Content Questionnaire to determine the dimensions of the extended job strain model, job demands, decision latitude, and social support. Jobs were categorized into high strain, low strain, active jobs, and passive jobs. During the 3-year follow-up, 87 coronary events were registered. At baseline, 17% of workers experienced high strain. Job demands and decision latitude were not significantly related to the development of coronary heart disease after adjustment for covariates. The 38% risk excess among subjects classified in the high-strain category did not reach statistical significance. However, coronary heart disease incidence was substantially associated with the social support scale independently of other risk factors, with an adjusted hazard ratio of 2.4 (95% confidence interval: 1.4, 4.0) between extreme tertiles. No convincing evidence for an association of job demands, decision latitude, or job strain with the short-term incidence of coronary heart disease was found. However, our study underscores the importance of a supportive social work environment in the prevention of coronary heart disease.
Job stress and sleep disorders: findings from the Helsinki Heart Study
Stress Medicine, 2000
Sleep disorders and daytime fatigue are common health problems in middle-aged and elderly populations, and they vary greatly between occupational groups. There is widespread evidence that working hours and job stress may explain these differences. In this study the relationship of job demands and job control to sleep disorders was investigated. The subjects were 3079 middle-aged working men. The data were collected with a questionnaire including scales on sleep quality, job stress and lifestyle. The main effects of job demands and job control on insomnia, sleep deprivation and daytime fatigue were highly signi®cant. Some interaction effects of the stressors were also noted. Lifestyle factors were not found as signi®cant mediators or confounders of the effects. The associations between the stressors and sleep disorders were greater in the daytime workers than in the shift workers. The main conclusion is that job stressors have a direct relationship to sleep disorders, independent of working hours and lifestyle.