• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.1-5
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• 2016

Background: Several studies have investigated the relationship between specific occupations and suicide mortality, as suicide rates differ by profession. The aim of this study was to investigate suicide mortality ratios across broad occupational groups in Greece for both sexes in the period 2000-2009. Methods: Data of suicide deaths were retrieved from the Hellenic Statistical Authority and comparative mortality ratios were calculated. Occupational classification was based on the International Classification of Occupations (ISCO-88) and the coding for Intentional self-harm (X60-X84) was based on the international classification of diseases (ICD-10). Results: Male dominant occupations, mainly armed forces, skilled farmers and elementary workers, and female high-skilled occupations were seen as high risk groups for suicide in a period of 10 years. The age-productive group of 30-39 years in Greek male elementary workers and the 50-59 age-productive group of Greek professional women proved to have the most elevated number of suicide deaths. Conclusion: Further research is needed into the work-related stressors of occupations with high suicide mortality risk and focused suicide prevention strategies should be applied within vulnerable working age populations.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.42 no.5
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• pp.323-330
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• 2009

Objectives : The aim of this study was to investigate whether working married women in different occupational classes affected diverse health outcomes. Methods : We used data for married women aged 25-59 (N=2,273) from the 2005 National Health and Nutritional Examination Survey. Outcome measures included physical/mental and subjective/objective indicators (selfrated poor health, chronic diseases, depression, and suicidal ideation from reported results; metabolic syndrome dyslipidemia from health examination results). Agestandardized prevalence and logistic regression were employed to assess health status according to three types working groups (housewives, married women in manual jobs, married women in non-manual jobs). Sociodemographic factors (age, numbers of children under 7, education, household income) and health behaviors (health examination, sleep, rest, exercise, smoking, drinking) and a psychological factor (stress) were considered as covariates. Results : Non-manual married female workers in Korea showed better health status in all five health outcomes than housewives. The positive health effect for the non-manual group persisted in absolute (age-adjusted prevalence) and relative (odds ratio) measures, but multivariate analyses showed an insignificant association of the non-manual group with dyslipidemia. Manual female workers showed significantly higher age-adjusted prevalence of almost all health outcomes than housewives except chronic disease, but the associations disappeared after further adjustment for covariates regarding sleep, rest, and stress. Conclusions : Our results suggest that examining the health impact of work on married women requires the consideration of occupational class.

• Annals of Occupational and Environmental Medicine
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• v.34
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• pp.34.1-34.13
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• 2022

Background: This study aimed to investigate the association between lead exposure and serum gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase (γGT) levels as an oxidative stress marker in male steelworkers. Methods: Data were collected during the annual health examination of workers in 2020. A total of 1,654 steelworkers were selected, and the variables for adjustment included the workers' general characteristics, lifestyle, and occupational characteristics. The association between the blood lead level (BLL) and serum γGT level was investigated by multiple linear and logistic regression analyses. The BLL and serum γGT values that were transformed into natural logarithms were used in multiple linear regression analysis, and the tertile of BLL was used in logistic regression analysis. Results: The geometric mean of the participants' BLLs and serum γGT level was 1.36 ㎍/dL and 27.72 IU/L, respectively. Their BLLs differed depending on age, body mass index (BMI), smoking status, drinking status, shift work, and working period, while their serum γGT levels differed depending on age, BMI, smoking status, drinking status, physical activity, and working period. In multiple linear regression analysis, the difference in models 1, 2, and 3 was significant, obtaining 0.326, 0.176, and 0.172 (all: p < 0.001), respectively. In the multiple linear regression analysis stratified according to drinking status, BMI, and age, BLLs were positively associated with serum γGT levels. Regarding the logistic regression analysis, the odds ratio of the third BLL tertile in models 1, 2, and 3 (for having an elevated serum γGT level within the first tertile reference) was 2.74, 1.83, and 1.81, respectively. Conclusions: BLL was positively associated with serum γGT levels in male steelworkers even at low lead concentrations (< 5 ㎍/dL).

• Journal of Technologic Dentistry
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.58-71
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• 1995

This study was carried out in order to examine demographic variables and personal and working conditions affecting to self-esteem, self-efficacy and work autonomy and mental health of the dental technicians. For this study, questionnaires composed of 50 items for the measurement of psychiatric symptom, work autonomy, self-esteem and self-efficacy index and 14 items related with demographic variables and personal and working conditions were distributed to 400 dental technicians and the 304 of them were statistically analyzed the results were as the following ; 1. Self-esteem and self- efficacy in dental technicians appeared to be interacted. 2. Score of self-efficacy index was higher in dental technicians of young age, or high or professional education than in otherwise dental technicians. 3. Score of self-efficacy index was higher in dental technicians of young age or professional education than in otherwise dental technicians. 4. All of self-esteem, self-efficacy and work autonomy in dental technicians affected directly their psychiatric symptom. 5. Promotion, and communication with fellows and senior workers of dental technicians affected directly their psychiatric symptom. 6. Each of anxiety, anger, depression and cognitive disturbance appeared to be interacted.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.20 no.1 s.21
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• pp.158-164
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• 1987

The purpose of this study is to analyze occupational history of coal miners with pneumoconiosis. In this study, occupational characteristics of 49 coal miners with pneumoconiosis were compared with those of 45 coal miners without pneumoconiosis but in similar age category($43{\sim}52$ years of age) based on interview survey. Various indices on occupational characteristics were developed for the following areas: duration of employment, perception of working condition, working density, dust concentration, temperature, humidity, and experience of respirator wearings. Perception of working condition were measured in 5 points scales but experiences of respirator wearing was measured in 3 points scale. Each index was multiplied by duration of employment. From the analysis, only the experience of respirator wearing showed statistically significant difference between the two groups. Therefore, respirator wearing seemed to be effective in reducing occurrence of pneumoconiosis.

• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.35 no.3
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• pp.153-161
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• 2009

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate 1) blood lead levels of workers at auto repair shops as Biological Exposure Indices (BEI) of toxic substances such as lead and toluene that are produced during automotive painting process, 2) the differences depending on personal characteristics of workers who have been exposed to toluene by using urine hippuric acid concentration as a marker and 3) the correlation between the concentration of hazardous chemicals in each workplace and the BEL. All subjects were male with a mean age of 36.2 years. In terms of age, most were in the 30 to 40 age group (13 persons, 48.1%). In relation to the length of work experience, the highest proportion had experience of 10 years of less (18 persons, 66.7%). Twenty three workers were cigarette smokers (85.2%) while 4 (14.8%) were non-smokers. In addition, more than 80% of the workers drank alcohol. Dust concentration and toluene exposure during automotive painting showed no significant difference with age, length of work experience, smoking and drinking while a significant difference (p<0.05) has been detected between lead concentration and smoking. The geometric mean of dust concentration, lead concentration and toluene concentration were $0.38mg/m^3,\;0.0021mg/m^3$ and 1.08ppm respectively. In addition, the geometric mean of blood lead levels and urine hippuric acid concentration were $1.70{\mu}g/dl$ and 0.25g/g respectively, which were lower than the standard levels suggested by the Ministry of Labor. To determine the influential factors on blood lead and urine hippuric acid concentrations, a correlation analysis has been conducted with variables of air, lead and toluene concentrations, age, length of work experience and amount of cigarette smoking. According to the analysis, a relatively high correlation (p<0.01) has been observed between air lead concentration and biological sample concentration.

• Journal of Convergence for Information Technology
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• v.11 no.11
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• pp.178-184
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• 2021

This study was conducted to empirically verify the factors that affect work-life balance according to the age of social workers. The subjects of the study were social workers working at social welfare centers, welfare centers for the disabled, and welfare centers for the elderly located in Jeollabuk-do, and 313 copies of 42 facilities that participated in the survey were used for the final analysis. The research method used a multi-level model that calculated individual factors (Level 1) and institutional factors (Level 2). The main research results are as follows. First, 20.2% of the total variance in the work-life balance of social workers was found to be different for each local welfare center. Second, as a result of examining the factors affecting work-life balance of social workers by age, it was found that job demands had a negative effect on work-life balance in all age groups. In particular, in their 30s, family demands and women's work-life balance were more negative than men's, and economic status was found to be an important influencing factor on work-life balance. Based on these results, we discussed ways to improve work-life balance for social workers.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.228-234
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• 2020

Background: The concept of social capital has its focus on cooperative relations in the workplace. This study investigates the association between social capital and sickness absence among workers in 41 work groups in the Danish dairy industry and examines the possible effects of an intervention on social capital in the workplace on sickness absence. Methods: A sample of 791 dairy workers working in 41 work groups that participated in an intervention study on social capital filled in a questionnaire on four subtypes of social capital, and social capital scores from individual participants were aggregated to the level of work groups. Sickness absence was measured at the level of work groups in company registers as the two-year average percentage of working time lost to sickness absence. Group-level associations between social capital and sickness absence were analyzed using multilevel linear regression analysis. Analyses were adjusted for age, gender, group size, and random effects at the workplace level. Results: We found statistically significant associations between social capital within work groups, social capital in relation to the immediate manager, and social capital toward the workplace as a whole on the one side and sickness absence on the other side. We found no support for any effects of the intervention on sickness absence. Conclusion: The work group level of social capital is associated with the work group level of sickness absence. However, the intervention to enhance group-level social capital had no effect on reducing sickness absence in the intervention group.

• Journal of the Korean Data and Information Science Society
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• v.26 no.6
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• pp.1271-1281
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• 2015

Competing risk analysis is widely applied to analyze a failure time with more than two causes. This paper discusses the application of a competing risk model to a economic activity state of workers with occupational injuries. In particular, main interest is to estimate the distribution of restarting time two kinds of economic activities, (i) returning to original working place and (ii) finding a new job. In this paper, we applied a cumulative incidence function to evaluate their patterns under several individual factors and working place's factor. Furthermore, a subdistributional regression model is applied to estimate the effect of these factors on the returning time. According to result, worker with higher education, younger age and longer working period had a higher chance to return an original working place while one with more severe injuries and skilled laborer had longer returning time to an original working place.

• Korea Journal of Hospital Management
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.1-20
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• 1999

Objectives: Quality of Working Life(QWL) is a set of employee's physical, mental conditions which are perceived at their work. Most employees and managers are concerned about the quality of working life as a strategy for improving organizational effectiveness. The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between QWL and organizational effectiveness of employees at the general hospital. Methods : Data were collected by self-administered questionnaires at the general hospital in Kyunggi-Do. Survey was conducted to 675 workers. QWL was measured by using 5 items from the scale developed by Walton(1973). Organizational effectiveness was measured by measuring organizational commitment, intention of job-shift, and job satisfaction. Results: The recognitions to each component of QWL were significantly different by socio-demographic characteristics such as sex, age, education levels and working duration. Also, QWL were significantly different by types of organizational culture. Multiple regression analysis and multiple logistic regression analysis were applied to find the relationship of QWL and organizational effectiveness. As a result, job-pride, compensation, working condition, human relationship and development showed significant relationship with organizational effectiveness. Conclusions: These results show that QWL is significantly related to organizational effectiveness. So we expect that this result will be used as basic informations for management and motivation of employees at the general hospital.