A psychosocially poor work environment means that employees experience highly demanding requirements but have little ability to control their work or not feel sufficiently appreciated for the contributions they make.
A dissertation at The Sahlgrenska Academy, Gothenburg University, shows that men who have recently suffered a heart attack or angina and who feel that they have a poor psychosocial work environment see a relationship between their heart disease and their work situation.
"These men often believe that it would take longer for them before they could return to work," says Mia Söderberg, the doctoral candidate who wrote the dissertation.
Warning signs
Men who do not have heart problems but who experience poor psychosocial work conditions often have warning signs for coronary artery disease, such as high blood pressure and high cholesterol values. Mia Söderberg can also draw the conclusion that these men more often change jobs, and points out here a difference between women and men.
"We could only see this connection with men, which may depend upon the labor market being segregated by gender and on woman and men generally working within different work categories where the capacity to influence ones work environment differs", Mia Söderberg says, and continues:
"For women the combination of job-related stress and household work may also have a greater influence on health and various health-related behavior than it has with men."
New focus on psychosocial factors
The labor market is no longer dominated by industry, but work instead deals more and more with knowledge processes and contact with other people.
"In work-related illness, we have also seen a shift from a focus on physical risk factors to a greater need to examine psychosocial factors," Mia Söderberg says.
The dissertation is based upon answers from 509 persons in Western Götaland with acute coronary symptoms, which encompasses all conditions in which arterial calcification has suddenly caused the heart not to have enough blood. 2492 randomly chosen residents of Greater Gothenburg and 75,236 male Swedish construction workers also answered surveys.
Explore further: Low levels of the DHEA prohormone predict coronary heart disease
More information: Link to the dissertation Psychosocial work conditions - cardiovascular disease, perceptions and reactive behavior.
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A psychosocially poor work environment means that employees experience highly demanding requirements but have little ability to control their work or not feel sufficiently appreciated for the contributions they make.
A dissertation at The Sahlgrenska Academy, Gothenburg University, shows that men who have recently suffered a heart attack or angina and who feel that they have a poor psychosocial work environment see a relationship between their heart disease and their work situation.
"These men often believe that it would take longer for them before they could return to work," says Mia Söderberg, the doctoral candidate who wrote the dissertation.
Warning signs
Men who do not have heart problems but who experience poor psychosocial work conditions often have warning signs for coronary artery disease, such as high blood pressure and high cholesterol values. Mia Söderberg can also draw the conclusion that these men more often change jobs, and points out here a difference between women and men.
"We could only see this connection with men, which may depend upon the labor market being segregated by gender and on woman and men generally working within different work categories where the capacity to influence ones work environment differs", Mia Söderberg says, and continues:
"For women the combination of job-related stress and household work may also have a greater influence on health and various health-related behavior than it has with men."
New focus on psychosocial factors
The labor market is no longer dominated by industry, but work instead deals more and more with knowledge processes and contact with other people.
"In work-related illness, we have also seen a shift from a focus on physical risk factors to a greater need to examine psychosocial factors," Mia Söderberg says.
The dissertation is based upon answers from 509 persons in Western Götaland with acute coronary symptoms, which encompasses all conditions in which arterial calcification has suddenly caused the heart not to have enough blood. 2492 randomly chosen residents of Greater Gothenburg and 75,236 male Swedish construction workers also answered surveys.
Explore further: Low levels of the DHEA prohormone predict coronary heart disease
More information: Link to the dissertation Psychosocial work conditions - cardiovascular disease, perceptions and reactive behavior.
Medical Xpress on facebook
Related Stories
Low levels of the DHEA prohormone predict coronary heart disease
Nov 10, 2014
Men with low levels of DHEA in the blood run an increased risk of developing coronary heart disease events. The Sahlgrenska Academy study has been published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
Going home on time can benefit workers' health
Nov 18, 2014
Public health researchers at the University of Adelaide say office workers can benefit themselves and their families by going home on time as much as possible, to reduce work-related illness.
Mentally stressed young women with heart disease more likely to have reduced blood flow to heart
Nov 16, 2014
Young women with stable coronary heart disease are more likely than men to have reduced blood flow to the heart if they're under emotional stress, but not physical stress, according to research presented ...
Women under 60 with diabetes at much greater risk for heart disease
Oct 31, 2013
Results of a Johns Hopkins study published today in the journal Diabetes Care found that young and middle-aged women with type 2 diabetes are at much greater risk of coronary artery disease than previously believed.
Women with high blood pressure get different treatment to men
Oct 14, 2014
Women who are treated for high blood pressure are not given the same medication as men, nor do they hit the treatment targets as often, reveals a thesis from the University of Gothenburg.
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13 minutes ago
Air pollution levels are linked to many forms of ill health, including higher risk of respiratory and cardiovascular diseases, especially for more vulnerable groups such as children and the elderly.
Naughty food photos attract more attention
36 minutes ago
Researchers have discovered a quirk in how we pay attention to food.
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2 hours ago
It seems like it should work: If everyone were tested for every disease, lives would be saved, right? These conditions would be spotted quickly, treated, and voilà: The deadly illness would be vanquished.
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3 hours ago
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User comments
Please sign in to add a comment. Registration is free, and takes less than a minute. Read more
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