Relationship between job, lifestyle, age and occupational injuries

Background Physical job demands (PJD), age, disability and lifestylemay influence the risk of occupational injury. Aim To assess the relationships between PJD, lifestyle and injuryin workers of various ages. Methods A total of 2888 randomly selected workers from northeasternFrance, aged 15, completed a postal questionnaire. The PJD scorewas defined as the total number of the following reported jobdemands: using pneumatic tools, other vibrating hand tools,hammers, machine tools or vibrating platforms and exposure tomanual handling tasks, awkward postures, high pace of work,high physical workload, work at heights, work in adverse climatesor exposure to noise, cold or heat. Data were analysed usinglogistic regression. Results Nine per cent of subjects reported an injury duringthe previous 2 years. The PJD score was related to the injuryrate for workers aged 45: crude odds ratio (OR) 3.5 (95% confidenceinterval = 1.5–8.0) for PJD = 1, 5.0 (2.2–11.3)for PJD = 2–3 and 14.5 (6.5–32.2) for PJD 4, versusPJD = 0. Lower ORs were found for those aged <30 (1.4, 4.2and 9.9, respectively) and 30–44 (1.5, 4.4 and 6.5, respectively).The differences between age groups remained when controllingfor all factors studied. Obesity, smoking and musculoskeletaldisorders were associated with injury risk in workers aged 45(adjusted ORs 1.7–2.6). Smoking was also an injury riskfactor for workers aged <30. Conclusions PJD and lifestyle have a higher impact on injuryrates among older workers than among younger ones. Injury preventionshould address reducing PJD and improving relevant lifestylefactors, especially for older workers.