Documents literature survey 430 results

"Skin cancers are becoming more prevalent even though many can be prevented. Women are more knowledgeable than men about skin cancer, yet they are more likely to sunbathe deliberately and to use artificial tanning equipment. The purpose of this article is to examine messages that women receive about the benefits of a tan. Particularly, we focused on how the indoor UV tanning industry represents the value of a tan to women. We subjected five issues of Smart Tan Canada to thematic analysis. We examined language in advertisements and articles that promote an artificial tan to women. Four themes emerged: Be Beautiful and Sexy; Look Young; Feel Better; and Science, Health, and Nature. These themes are especially effective in a culture that routinely objectifies women and places a high degree of value on their appearance. We suggest that appearance-based interventions, media literacy training, and legislation could counteract the messages in the themes."

"OBJECTIVES:
To clarify the associations between psychosocial work stressors and mental ill health, a meta-analysis of psychosocial work stressors and common mental disorders was undertaken using longitudinal studies identified through a systematic literature review.
METHODS:
The review used a standardized search strategy and strict inclusion and quality criteria in seven databases in 1994-2005. Papers were identified from 24,939 citations covering social determinants of health, 50 relevant papers were identified, 38 fulfilled inclusion criteria, and 11 were suitable for a meta-analysis. The Comprehensive Meta-analysis Programme was used for decision authority, decision latitude, psychological demands, and work social support, components of the job-strain and iso-strain models, and the combination of effort and reward that makes up the effort-reward imbalance model and job insecurity. Cochran's Q statistic assessed the heterogeneity of the results, and the I2 statistic determined any inconsistency between studies.
RESULTS:
Job strain, low decision latitude, low social support, high psychological demands, effort-reward imbalance, and high job insecurity predicted common mental disorders despite the heterogeneity for psychological demands and social support among men. The strongest effects were found for job strain and effort-reward imbalance.
CONCLUSIONS:
This meta-analysis provides robust consistent evidence that (combinations of) high demands and low decision latitude and (combinations of) high efforts and low rewards are prospective risk factors for common mental disorders and suggests that the psychosocial work environment is important for mental health. The associations are not merely explained by response bias. The impact of work stressors on common mental disorders differs for women and men."

"Objectives Many studies have investigated the association between long working hours and health. By focusing on differences in the definition of long working hours and the influence of shift work, we attempt to explain why the results of these studies remain inconclusive. Methods We defined long working hours as working time greater than around 40 hours per week or 8 hours per day. Since previous studies have indicated that shift work is detrimental to health, we minimized the influence of shift work in the studies. We also placed importance on the existence of reference groups since this made the results clearer. Based on these points, we analyzed previous studies to clarify the epidemiological evidence regarding the association between long working hours and health. We established inclusion criteria and carried out a systematic search for articles published in the Medline and PsycINFO databases between 1995–2012.Results We identified a total of 17 articles and 19 studies (12 prospective cohort and 7 cross-sectional studies). The outcomes were all-cause mortality, circulatory disease, diabetes mellitus, metabolic syndrome, depressive state, anxiety, other psychological disorders, sleep condition, cognitive function, and health-related behavior. Long working hours had significant adverse effects on most health outcomes. Conclusions We concluded that working long hours is associated with depressive state, anxiety, sleep condition, and coronary heart disease. However, further studies that appropriately deal with the definition of long working hours and shift work are needed."

"The objective of this literature survey was to appraise the methodological quality of economic evaluations of occupational safety and health (OSH) interventions conducted from a corporate perspective published in various OSH databases. A total of 37 articles were selected based on seven criteria addressing study population, type of intervention, comparative intervention, outcome, costs, language, and perspective. Only 44% of the studies met more than 50% of the quality criteria. Of the 19 quality criteria, eight were met by 50% or more of the studies. The overall methodological quality of the economic evaluations of OSH interventions from a corporate perspective was poor. As such, there is a risk of biased results. The quality of future evaluations needs to be improved to increase the validity of their conclusions and recommendations."

"Suite à une recension de la littérature en sociologie faite pour le Collège d'expertise sur les risques psychosociaux, nous avons relevé un certain nombre de situations de « désajustement ». Des formes d'organisation, des évolutions du travail apparemment mineures, ou des réorganisations, entraînent chez les salariés un sentiment de déséquilibre dans la situation de travail qui peut être pénible à vivre. Cet article plaide pour que ces situations de travail produisant des « décalages » ne soient pas vues de haut, ni par les organisateurs du travail, ni par ceux qui l'étudient. Même si ces désajustements sont difficiles à capter dans une enquête statistique, il pourrait être envisagé de tenter de le faire, au moins partiellement."

"Les études mesurant les effets des facteurs psychosociaux au travail sur la santé mentale utilisent de préférence les modèles largement documentés de demande-latitude-support (DLS) de Karasek et al. et de déséquilibre-effort-reconnaissance (DER) de Siegrist. Or il existe d'autres modèles théoriques encore peu documentés, exploités et/ou analysés. Par une revue de littérature d'études prospectives réalisées dans les pays industrialisés de 1990 à 2010, notre article a pour objectif de présenter les modèles DLS et DER et de préciser leurs limites, d'exposer l'état des connaissances concernant l'effet sur la santé mentale des facteurs psychosociaux de trois modèles émergents (la justice organisationnelle, le leadership, et la prévisibilité – ou prédictabilité – au travail), et de déterminer si ces effets sont indépendants des modèles DLS et DER. Les résultats des études démontrent que les facteurs psychosociaux mesurés par le modèle de la justice organisationnelle ont des effets délétères sur la santé mentale, indépendamment des modèles DLS et DER. Des effets négatifs du leadership et de la prévisibilité sur la santé mentale ont également été observés dans une majorité des études, mais le nombre limité d'études prospectives ne permet pas de conclure de façon aussi assurée au statut explicatif de ces modèles. Quoi qu'il en soit, les modèles émergents permettent de mesurer certains facteurs psychosociaux non pris en compte par les modèles DLS et DER et nous semblent mériter d'être intégrés dans de futures études prospectives sur la santé au travail."

The systematic review by Konijnenberg et al (1) in this issue of the Scandinavian Journal of Work Environment & Health deals with conservative treatment methods for the great problem of neck and upper-limb disorders in working populations. Fifteen randomized controlled trials (RCT) or controlled clinical trials (CCT) fulfilled the inclusion criteria of the review. Five of these scored 6/12 or higher according to their internal validity criteria and were considered high-quality studies. In the presence of a wide range of treatments, no treatment modality could be evaluated on the basis of a remarkable number of high-quality studies. There was, however, limited evidence in favor of physiotherapy, exercises, and ergonomic improvements. Repetitive strain injury (RSI) is a loose concept used in this review broadly to encompass a range of disorders from the neck and thoracic spinal area to the fingertip. In principle, outcomes in treatment or intervention studies should be based on symptoms or findings or both independently of the etiologic factors of the disease, and we should avoid concepts that include the assumed etiologic factor. To me, "neck and upper-limb disorders in working populations" would have seemed to be a more appropriate concept, especially since the work-relatedness of the conditions is difficult to assess; in fact it was not even addressed in some of the studies reviewed. Moreover, the requirement of work-relatedness resulted in the exclusion of some potentially high-quality studies (2) that did not have "work-relatedness" as an inclusion criterion, but still probably dealt with a largely similar group of disorders. For instance, in the study of Taimela et al (2), one inclusion criterion was the possession of a permanent job. But if we accept the concept of repetitive strain injury and assume that repetitive movements are one of the major causes of this strain, would not then modification of exposure (or engineering control) be a natural component in a treatment aimed to enhance recovery and prevent recurrence? Many of us would probably say yes, but a look at the tables in the review shows that only very few studies had workplace adjustment as a treatment or as one constituent in the treatment protocol. Another conspicuous feature of this review and also of some other related recent reviews (for an example, see reference 3) is that ergonomic intervention has usually been carried out in the office environment. While there is no doubt that office workers do have work-related musculoskeletal problems, such problems are even more frequent in the construction, transportation, and manufacturing industries and in some branches of the service sector, for example, hospital, kitchen, and cleaning work (4). Hopefully, the target workplaces for future workplace intervention studies will be determined by the size and seriousness of the problems and not only by the feasibility of carrying out an intervention study, such as stationary work in an office environment versus a changing work environment at a construction site, or the marketing of new input devices or computers. The magnitude or the duration of the treatment effects did not deserve much attention in this review, which is understandable since high-quality studies were few in number. However, a look at the high-quality studies shows that a modest reduction in pain was typical, and this effect was no longer present in the later phases of follow-up. Cost-effectiveness aspects were not considered in any of the studies included in this review. The relatively meager results in most studies do not suggest that the treatments were cost-effective in general. Many risk factors contribute to the occurrence of neck and upper-limb disorders among working populations (5, 6, 7). In a multifactorial condition, it is unlikely that a single measure would result in significant relief, something that is suggested by the meager results in several studies accepted for review. With regard to the etiology of most neck and upper-limb disorders, multidisciplinary approaches should have a higher potential. Unfortunately, multidisciplinary rehabilitation had been tried in only one controlled clinical trial, which received a very low score. The authors are correct in being worried about the use of multiple outcomes in intervention studies, the result being a high likelihood that a positive result is obtained by one of the outcomes by chance. Researchers should be more critical in the design of their studies. They should select only the most relevant outcome measures and restrict the outcomes only to them. Most studies relied solely on subjective outcome parameters, since few generally accepted objective methods exist. This is a major scientific problem, especially since blinding subjects for treatment is hardly possible. A major question of treatment policy in relation to neck and upper-limb disorders among working populations is whether the focus should be on treating the individual or his or her environment, especially in the control of workload. Trying to get an answer from workplace intervention studies, especially randomized controlled trials, involves an inherent potential of bias. As it is much easier to randomize individuals into different physical therapies, exercise or other treatment modalities, than it is to randomize workstations to be changed or not, there will always be more randomized controlled trials with treatments directed toward the individual. Therefore, there are greater chances of obtaining positive results from such treatments at the cost of engineering controls. Moreover, the current instability at workplaces, with high turnover rates and frequent reorganizations, makes it increasingly difficult to carry out workplace intervention studies successfully. It is easy to share the authors' worry about the absence of high-quality studies as evidence for the effect of most currently used treatment modalities. As the authors say, there is a higher possibility of bias, for example, an erroneous positive result of a treatment, in a low-quality study than in one of high-quality. This issue was systematically addressed in a review on acupuncture trials involving chronic neck and back pain (8), in which the authors were able to show that the most valid trials tended to have negative results. Konijnenberg and his collaborators' review shows convincingly that the scientific basis for current treatment practices with respect to neck and upper-limb disorders in working populations is limited and based largely on low-quality studies. More high-quality studies are definitely needed. Moreover, research priorities should not be restricted to groups of workers and treatment modalities that are easy to study. Instead, studies should be undertaken on treatment modalities that carry a potential to be efficacious. Worker groups with the highest risk of neck and upper-limb disorders should be the focus. Such studies are often laborious and should therefore be supported by sufficient funding. It is possible that new knowledge from such studies may change our understanding of the efficacy of some treatments and, therefore, create pressure to change current treatment practices. What should the practitioner do now while we are still waiting for the results of such studies? The Panel on Musculoskeletal Disorders established by the National Research Council and the Institute of Medicine concluded in their review that the epidemiologic evidence for upper-extremity disorders supports the important role of physical load factors (7). Based on this evidence, primary and secondary intervention at the workplace, including engineering and administrative controls, was recommended. As there are still few prospective studies on incident neck and upper-limb disorders, it is difficult, on the basis of epidemiologic studies, to estimate the relative potential of these measures in primary versus secondary prevention.

This paper reviews articles published during 1970-1997 from 48 epidemiologic studies on occupational and environmental risk factors of ovarian cancer. Current evidence is characterized by poorly focused data for occupational and environmental agents, vulnerability to biases, and an almost complete lack of quantitative exposure-response data. The moderate amount of data on nurses, teachers, professionals, dry cleaning employees, women in agriculture, pharmaceutical industry, pharmacists, waitresses, and cooks show very little, if any, evidence of excess risk. Hairdressers, beauticians, and women employed in the printing industry may be at increased risk, but the data are insufficient for strong conclusions. Some case-referent studies suggest a modest-to-moderate excess in association with genital talc application. Few high-quality studies have been carried out, and no chemical agents have been studied extensively, with the exception of exposure to talc. Ovarian cancer may have occupational and environmental etiologies intertwined with cultural, behavioral, and life-style factors and genetic susceptibility, but current knowledge is insufficient to quantify occupational and environmental etiologies reliably. Well-designed analytic epidemiologic studies with sufficient power are needed.

"Gender differences in the prevalence of musculoskeletal complaints might be explained by differences in the effect of exposure to work-related physical and psychosocial risk factors. A systematic review was conducted to examine gender differences in the relations between these risk factors and musculoskeletal complaints. Several electronic databases were searched. The strength of the evidence was determined on the basis of the methodological quality and consistency of the study results. For lifting, strong evidence was found that men have a higher risk of back complaints than women. The same was found for the relation between hand-arm vibration and neck-shoulder complaints. For arm posture, strong evidence was found that women have a higher risk of neck-shoulder complaints than men. For social support, no evidence of a gender difference was found for either neck-shoulder or back complaints. For hand-wrist and lower-extremity complaints, inconclusive evidence was found due to a lack of high-quality studies."