Dynamics of indices of the workers’ health in different labor intensity

Abstract

Introduction. Work and stress occupy a leading place among the causes of diseases of Russians. Working hours and work intensity (WI) are the main parameters of the workload. The main difficulty of physiological analysis, measurement, and hygienic assessment of WI is a purely individual psychophysiological characteristic of the degree of stress of the working person’s body, being masked by three factors: the composition and organization of labor actions, personal factor, and hygienic working conditions. The individual physiological range of average work intensity (IR) is 1.5. The change in WI inside of this diapason determines the intra-shift dynamics of performance, from the typical monotonous activity to the characteristic of neuro-humoral stress. The criterion for physiological and hygienic assessment of Wt is the stability of the dynamics of performance, fatigue, and health indices of employees.The purpose of the study: to establish the annual increase in the risk of health disorders of employees at different levels of physiological intensity of work, correlated with IR. Materials and methods. We studied WI and the dynamics of health index s(DZ) in 2509 physical and mental workers with varying degrees of fatigue (industrial workers, doctors, nurses, school teachers, office workers). The annual increase in risk (AIR) chronic fatigue syndrome, cardiovascular diseases, and diseases of the musculoskeletal system, long-term morbidity with the temporary disability (MTD) was used to characterize the WI.Results. With high and high WI, the long-MTD AIR (0.80%) of the watch factory workers is 3.2 times higher than the control level - 0.25%. At a high WI level (1.11-1.20) of the installers, the AIR of cardiovascular diseases with MTD (1.0%) is 6.7 times higher than the control level of 0.15%, and the GPR of musculoskeletal diseases (1.1%) is 7.9 times higher than the control level of 0.14%. In precision workers with increased WI (1.01-1.10), the AIR of chronic fatigue syndrome (1.98%) exceeds the background level of 0.5% per year by 3.9 times, and with a high WI level (1.11-1.20), the AIR of musculoskeletal disorders exceeds the control level (0.2%) by 10.7 times. The maximum WI values for mental workers are 5-14% higher than those set for manual labor.Conclusions. 1. The IR is determined by the ratio of the maximum labor productivity, at which there is still no employee fatigue at the end of the working day, to the productivity, at which there is large employee fatigue. IR = 1.5. 2. When WI is 20 -30% above the lower bound of IR, there are 2-4 times increased AIR health disorders; while WI 30-40% higher than the lower border of IR, AIR for chronic fatigue syndrome, cardiovascular disease, diseases of the musculoskeletal system increases by 5-10 times. 3. Long hours, which are often considered the main risk factor for the health of workers, are the actual risk factor if the work is not performed at a reduced intensity.