Changes in Working Environments and Occupational Mental Health(Symposium/Effects of Social Situation and Working Environment on Health and Disease)

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  • 労働環境の変化と職場のメンタルヘルス(シンポジウム:社会情勢,労働環境,そして健康と疾病,2010年,第51回日本心身医学会総会ならびに学術講演会(仙台))
  • 労働環境の変化と職場のメンタルヘルス
  • ロウドウ カンキョウ ノ ヘンカ ト ショクバ ノ メンタル ヘルス

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Abstract

In recent years, occupational stress has increased among Japanese workers because of changes in their working environments and systems, such as organizational restructuring, or decreased consideration for others at the workplace. For example, about 60% of Japanese workers perceive stress due to interpersonal relationships, job demands, difficulty of their job, and so on. Occupational stress is extremely important for workers owing to its adverse effects on physical issues, as well as mental health, and work-related issues, such as performance, accidents, absenteeism and illnesses. It has been estimated that about 8% of workers are absent from work beyond a year because of illness. In particular, considerable attention has been paid to cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, including Karoshi, and mental illnesses. The number of these diseases covered by the workers' accident compensation insurance is generally increasing in recent years. It is noteworthy that power harassment has become one of the major reasons of mental illness at the workplace. These problems are important not only for occupational doctors, but also for medical specialists, such as those in psychosomatic medicine and psychiatry. To prevent stress-related diseases and to promote individual and occupational health, the assessment of stress levels by means of an objective and quantitative method is desirable. It has been suggested that salivary alpha-amylase (sAMY) reflects sympathetic activity and is a useful stress-related biomarker, because saliva collection is easy, stress-free and noninvasive. We practiced several kinds of studies to investigate the possibility of using a hand-held monitor. The investigated levels of sAMY were not significantly changed by speech stress or mental arithmetic stress. However, the levels showed a tendency to increase in response to a color word test and decrease following relaxation using autogenic training. Inter-individual, and possibly intra-individual, differences in the reactivity of sAMY are considered to affect the results.

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