SEARCH · PubMed Health
Explore indexed PubMed citations for clinical trials, systematic reviews and public health research. Read source abstracts and follow each citation to its original PubMed record.
Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.
Many railway occupations have special work conditions which considerably depend on peculiarities of work and therefore could not undergo hygienic regulation. The article gives examples of such occupations connected mostly with personal risk in railway traffic, marked work hardness, etc. Reasonable privileges and compensations are established for those occupations.
The working conditions in 225 small-scale industrial premises representing nine different trades with a labor force of 1,497 were studied. The provision of drinking water, hand washing and toilet facilities, eating places and cloakrooms was found to be generally unsatisfactory. The indoor workers were on the whole better provided for than those working outdoors except for the provision of cloakrooms and eating places where the reverse was the case. Sanitation was found to be inversely related to the size of the firms (p less than 0.05). Ways of improving the conditions of these people working in rather hazardous circumstances are discussed.
Recent studies have shown that women factory workers report more health symptoms than men. Reporting of health symptoms by 661 workers at nine poultry slaughterhouses in Québec was examined to determine whether this difference has its origins in sex-specific working conditions. More women than men report that their jobs involve standing still, repetitive movements, and a very rapid work rate. While women workers reported more health symptoms, these symptoms primarily affected the musculoskeletal and nervous systems, and were related to ergonomic and organizational job characteristics. Reported symptom levels were in closer agreement for subsamples of women and men with similar working conditions. This study demonstrates the importance of considering environmental, organizational, and ergonomic conditions at the work station as constituents of a microenvironment in order to understand the complex determinants of health symptoms associated with work in female employment ghettos.
Attention and assistance to enhance the role of small and medium scale enterprises (SMEs) by the government is more emphasized due to the success of SMEs in earning significant amount of foreign currency when Indonesia had to face economical crisis in 1997. This policy has been highly recognized again since the bombing tragedy in 2002; with the excellent evidence to show how important SMEs is in helping and maintaining the economic development of Bali. But in the implementation the assistance needs to be remanaged again in a more proper and appropriate way to attain the ultimate goals. The three economic potentials, agriculture in broad sense, tourism and SMEs (cottage industry included), must be developed in harmony, interdependence, support and complementary each other, if possible as synergist to obtain sustainable development of Bali. While assistance to SMEs must be done in a more coordinated way among the government technical offices, universities, NGOs, banking, and other social community institutions. By doing so, there would be no duplication or gap, nor creation of new disadvantageous problems. It could be in form of ergonomics, occupational health and safety impacts and problems in particular, and in adverse working conditions and environment in general. Therefore it is a must at this moment to carry out total approach in helping SMEs, by integrating the effort to improve their working conditions and environment, built-in within the effort to enhance SMEs'quality of life through economic assistance. In this process a total approach through SHIP approach and Appropriate Technology intervention must be done wisely and timely. By so doing, SMEs'sustainable working conditions and environment shall be attained.
In the wake of welfare reform, thousands of low-income single mothers have transitioned into the labor market. In this article, the authors examine how the work conditions of mothers leaving welfare for employment are associated with the emotional well-being of 372 children ages 5 to 15 years. The authors examine the cumulative incidence, over a 5-year period, of maternal non-family-friendly work conditions, including long work hours, erratic work schedules, nonday shifts, and lengthy commute times, in association with children's internalizing and externalizing behavior problems and levels of positive behavior. The authors found that mothers' lengthy commute times are associated with higher levels of internalizing problem behaviors and lower levels of positive behaviors.
We assess the impact of maternal sense of mastery and maternal working conditions on maternal perceptions of children's behavior problems as a means to study the transmission of social control across generations. We use a sample of 521 employed mothers and their four-to six-year-old children from the National Longitudinal Survey's Youth Cohort in 1986. Regarding working conditions, we consider mother's hourly wage, work hours, and job content including involvement with things (vs. people), the requisite level of physical activity, and occupational complexity. We also consider maternal and child background and current family characteristics, including marital status, family size, and home environment. Maternal mastery was related to fewer reported behavior problems among children. Lower involvement with people and higher involvement with things, as well as low physical activity, were related significantly to higher levels of perceived problems. In addition, recent changes in maternal marital status, including maternal marriage or remarriage, increased reports of problems; stronger home environments had the opposite effect. We interpret these findings as suggesting how maternal experiences of control in the workplace and personal resources of control can influence the internalization of control in children.
BACKGROUND: This study examined the association between psychosocial and organizational work conditions and mental health among women employed in the cleaning profession in Norway. METHODS: Self-report questionnaires were mailed to 661 cleaning staff personnel from seven cleaning organizations in seven different cities across Norway. The response rate was 64%, of which 374 (88%) respondents were women. The questionnaires assessed socio-demographic information and employment history, work organization, and psychosocial working conditions. The Hopkins Symptoms Checklist (HSCL-25) was included to assess mental health. RESULTS: On average, respondents were 43 years old and reported 10.8 years of experience working in the cleaning industry. The proportion of women scoring a HSCL-25 equal to or above 1.75 was 17.5%, which was higher than the average prevalence of mental health problems among working Norwegian women (8.4%). A factor analysis of the questions specific to the psychosocial work environment identified the following four underlying dimensions: leadership, co-workers, time pressure/control, and information/knowledge. Two of these, poor satisfaction with leadership (OR = 3.6) and poor satisfaction with co-workers (OR = 2.3), were significantly related to mental health. In addition, having contact with colleagues less than once a day (OR = 2.4) and not being ethnically Norwegian (OR = 3.0) increased the risk for mental health problems. CONCLUSION: Mental health problems are frequent among female cleaning professionals in Norway. Our results indicate that quality of leadership, collaboration with co-workers, and ethnicity were significantly associated with mental health.
A 23-item questionnaire measuring 4 relatively independent dimensions of working conditions and work atmosphere was developed on the basis of 252 respondents of the nursing staff in 22 institutions for the elderly, each comprising different levels of care. The factoranalytically derived and itemanalytically tested subscales measure the relation to management, colleagues and the aged inhabitants as well as working load. These institutional characteristics can be well illustrated in profiles and differentiate between single institutional different types of facilities and groups of them, belonging to different organisations. The validity of the different dimensions could be proven with regard to external criteria, both on facility level and on individual basis. According to our experience such profiles of working climate are well suited to stimulate problem discussions within the institutions and the exchange of experiences between the managers of different facilities.
In recent years, work and occupational activity have come to assume a therapeutic orientation in the rehabilitation of persons with mental illness. The study presented addressed the specific ways in which work activities during rehabilitation programme participation may act in a manner conducive to rehabilitation. The findings point to a positive relationship between the opportunities objectively available in the work setting for rehabilitees to influence aversive conditions or occurrences and their work-related subjective well-being. A second step enabled us to show that subjective well-being is determined less by the situation objectively at hand but primarily by the mentally ill rehabilitees' perceptions of influenceability and, hence, the experience of controllability. Further, examination of the rehabilitees' attributional patterns concerning the various control experiences revealed that the extent to which their subjective well-being is affected is mediated cognitively. The findings are discussed in view of their implications for the vocational rehabilitation of persons with mental illness.
OBJECTIVE: To describe the sociodemographic characteristics, work conditions, sexual behavior, and prevalence of HIV, hepatitis B (HBV), and hepatitis C (HCV) infection and of other sexually transmitted infections among a group of female immigrant prostitutes in Madrid. METHODS: We performed a descriptive study of a group of immigrant women who worked as prostitutes and who attended a sexually transmitted diseases (STD) clinic in Madrid in 1999 and 2000. Information was collected on sociodemographic characteristics, work conditions, use of injected drugs, and sexual practices with their clients and in their private lives. The services provided included screening for the main STDs and serological studies for HIV, HBV and HCV. RESULTS: A total of 579 female immigrants were analyzed. The mean age was 28.7 years. Ninety-six percent were from Latin America. None reported having consumed injected drugs. They began to work as prostitutes at a mean age of 27.4 years and 93.3% of them began in Spain. In the previous month, 98% had always used condoms for vaginal and anal penetrations with their clients and 17.6% had used them in their private sexual relations. Thirty percent reported condom breakage during intercourse. The prevalence of HIV and HCV infection was 0.2 and 0.9%, respectively; 8.1% showed HIV anticore antibodies and 0.5% showed surface antigens. An ulcerative STD was diagnosed in 2.1% and a non-ulcerative STD was diagnosed in 16%. CONCLUSIONS: Condoms are generally used with clients although the frequency of breakage is high. Condom use in prostitutes personal lives is dramatically lower. The prevalence of markers for HIV, HBV and HCV is low and the frequency of STD is moderate.
BACKGROUND: Physicians at the beginning of their specialist education have been reported to be especially exposed to stress and difficult working conditions. Considerable worry has also been caused by reports about anaesthetists dying at a younger age than other specialists as well as by reports about higher than average suicide rates among anaesthetists. Maybe as a consequence, many young doctors are reluctant to choose anaesthesiology as their future specialty. The aim of this study was to investigate what difficulties trainee anaesthetists experience at work. METHODS: Nineteen trainee anaesthetists in six Swedish hospitals were interviewed. Phenomenological analysis of the interview text was performed. RESULTS: All trainees had experienced considerable, sometimes extreme demands at work. Most of them often felt insufficient and inadequate and had problems with the professional role. Support from consultants was sometimes lacking. Some trainees expressed deep feelings of loneliness and helplessness in difficult clinical situations. CONCLUSIONS: This study shows that trainee anaesthetists have to live up to high work demands, often with very little support. Because too much stress is an obstacle to professional learning, such working conditions are a hindrance to good specialist education. The first measure to be taken should be to ensure that all trainee anaesthetists always have easy access to senior cover.
For the first time it is proposed to use the method of assessing the etiological risk for the quantitative determination of working conditions impact on morbidity associated with temporary disability. A comparison was made of indicators of working conditions impact on morbidity associated with temporary disability with the help of a single-factor dispersion analysis and by calculating etiological risk on the basis of the same background information--monthly morbidity associated with temporary disability among workshop workers and a control group: the results were the same. But the calculation of etiological risk is more simple.
Characterizes working conditions for the main professions of railway transport. Labor conditions are hygienically unfavorable and involve intensive exercise and emotional strain. The authors propose prophylactic and sanitation measures to improve labor conditions for this population.
The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of a weekly exercise programme among nursing staff on organizational/psychosocial and physical work conditions, and psychosomatic symptoms. Out of 106 nurses and nursing aides from four geriatric wards who were invited to participate in a cross-over study, 86 accepted. For the exercise periods the staff were invited to participate in an exercise programme twice a week for 8 weeks during work time. Fifty subjects participated > or = 8 times regularly during the exercise periods (participants). During the control periods, 78 subjects attended without intervention. The effect was followed-up with questionnaires before and after the intervention periods. The exercise programme did not affect perceived organizational/psychosocial or physical work conditions, with one exception. A higher change for the worse was seen in the factor "work planning" during the exercise periods compared with during the control periods. The result suggests that the organization of the training is important in order not to add extra stress.
The MSK-15 mechanized line for white-beet processing corresponds to the 2nd class (permissible conditions) with regard to the work-load of female beet-sorters, and to the 3rd class of labour intensity (1st degree of unhealthy conditions of work). By the end of the working shift the women-sorters were displaying functional overstrain of CNS and CVS, neuro-muscular overstrain of the upper extremities. Measures for working conditions improvement should include an ergonomic perfection of the working sites, improvement of the regimen of work and rest, means of individual technical safety.
Present method evaluating the quality of environment (using MAC and MAL) does not enable to assess completely and objectively the work conditions of building industry due to multiple confounding elements. A solution to this complicated problem including the analysis of various correlating elements of the system "human--work conditions--environment" may be encouraged by social norm of morbidity, which is independent on industrial and natural environment. The complete integral assessment enables to see the whole situation and reveal the points at risk.
OBJECTIVE: To find out whether family or working conditions is most important for mood in different ages in women. DESIGN: Prospective study. SETTING: Göteborg, Sweden, population about 430,000. SUBJECTS: Representative samples of a general population of women, born in 1930 (n = 276), 1942 (n = 93) and 1954 (n = 61), examined both in 1980-81 and 1992-93. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Associations between "mood" and different social factors indicated by correlation coefficients and studied cross-sectionally and longitudinally. RESULTS: In younger women, the variable "mood" was associated with variable work situation but not family situation (correlation coefficient 0.47, p <0.001, and correlation coefficient 0.26, not statistically significant, respectively), while in older women "mood" was associated with variable family situation as well as work situation (correlation coefficients 0.45 and 0.41, p <0.01 both). Changes in the mood variable between 1980-81 and 1992-93 were associated with changes in working conditions in the younger cohort, but with changes in variable family conditions in the older cohort. CONCLUSIONS: In the latest born cohort, the importance of women's paid work outside the home was increased as an influential factor on mood in comparison with the importance of the family situation, while the situation was the opposite in the earlier born cohorts.
OBJECTIVE: To examine the association between relative body weight and health status and the potential modifying effects of socioeconomic position and working conditions on this association. RESEARCH METHODS AND PROCEDURES: The data were derived from three identical cross-sectional surveys conducted in 2000, 2001, and 2002. Respondents to postal surveys were middle-aged employees of the City of Helsinki (7148 women and 1799 men, response rate 67%). BMI was based on self-reported weight and height. Health status was measured by the Short-Form 36 subscales and component summaries. RESULTS: Body weight was inversely associated with physical health, but in mental health, differences between BMI categories were small and inconsistent. In women, physical health deteriorated monotonically with increasing BMI, whereas in men, poor physical health was found among the obese only. Socioeconomic position did not modify the association between BMI and health. In women, the association between body weight and physical health became stronger with decreasing job control and increasing physical work load, whereas in men, a similar modifying effect was found for high job demands. DISCUSSION: Body weight was associated with physical health only. Lower levels of relative weight in women than in men may be associated with poor physical health. High body weight combined with adverse working conditions may impose a double burden on physical health.