title: Relationship among workload, health complaints, and depressive state of workers as revealed using a questionnaire survey.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Identifying the relationship between workload content and health complaints would likely aid the establishment of preventative health care strategies.
  
  
  METHODS
  The study population consisted of 137 male workers from a pharmaceutical company.
  
  
  METHODS
  The workloads of the target subjects were divided into three groups (A, B, and C+D) according to the scores of a self-administered questionnaire. The results of General Health Questionnaire (GHQ, 12 items version) for assessing health complaints were also analyzed.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The percentages of workers who reported feelings of stress in response to overtime work, irregular work, business trips, nighttime work, no rest and/or no nap, mental workload, and physical workload were 22.6%, 15.3%, 2.9%, 8.0%, 13.9%, 58.3%, and 18.2%, respectively. The significant odds ratio of workload predicting health complaints was 6.9 for subjects in group B and 13.9 for subjects in group C+D. Among them, the significant odds ratios of mental workload predicting health complaints and a positive GHQ were 5.7 and 4.0, respectively. Having no regular exercise also resulted in ORs of greater than 3 for health complaints and a positive GHQ.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  To cope with the health complaints of workers, mental health support by reducing individual workloads is recommended.
authors.affiliation: Department of Hygiene and Public Health, Nippon Medical School, Japan. kawada@nms.ac.jp
authors.forename: Tomoyuki
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kawada
authors.forename: Harumi
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Ueda
authors.forename: Mikiko
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hayashi
authors.forename: Ayako
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sakamoto
authors.forename: Kaoru
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Uchida
authors.forename: Takako
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Shirato
authors.forename: Risa
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Etoh
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003863:Depression / Q000209:etiology; D004345:Drug Industry; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D008019:Life Style; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D008603:Mental Health; D008875:Middle Aged; D016272:Occupational Health; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014940:Work Schedule Tolerance / Q000502:physiology* / Q000523:psychology*; D016526:Workload / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data