Background
There has been an increasing interest in studying sickness presenteeism (SP). An ever‐increasing amount of scientific literature is published using this term, yet there appears to be ...considerable heterogeneity in how it is assessed, which could result in substantial differences in the definition and interpretation of the phenomenon really being studied. We aim to discuss what really is being studied, depending on how the phenomenon is operationalized, measured, and analyzed.
Methods
A study based on a literature review and an empirical illustration using data of the third Spanish Psychosocial Risks Survey (2016).
Results
Differences are observed based on the population in which SP is measured, the cut‐off points used to define a worker as presenteeist, the reasons for an SP episode and even an analysis of the phenomenon treated as a count or as a dichotomous.
Conclusions
Without being completely exclusive, it seems that restricting the population of analysis to only those workers who consider that they should not have gone to work due to their health, and/or establishing low cut‐off points to define someone as presenteeist, would more clearly delimit the study of SP to the exercise of a right to sick leave. In contrast, working with the entire population or using high cut‐off points appears to relate the study of SP more with health status and less with the exercise of rights. On the other hand, taking the reasons for SP into account would probably help to improve interpretation of the phenomenon.
Purpose
To assess the prevalence of poor mental health and of exposure to psychosocial risks among the working population in Spain in 2005, 2010 and 2016; to analyse the associations between ...workplace psychosocial exposures and mental health problems according to gender and occupation.
Methods
Three representative samples of the Spanish working population were analysed, in 2005 (
n
= 7,023), 2010 (
n
= 4,979), and 2016 (
n
= 1,807). Prevalence ratios between mental health and the five dimensions – job demands, job control, social support, employment insecurity and insecurity over working conditions—were estimated using multilevel mixed-effects Poisson regressions. All the analyses were separated by gender and occupation.
Results
In 2016, there were improvements in job control, job demands and social support, and deteriorations in employment insecurity and insecurity over working conditions. The risk of poor mental health among manual workers rose if they were exposed to high demands, low social support and high employment insecurity; among non-manual workers, the risk increased if they were exposed to high demands, low control, low social support and high insecurity over working conditions. There were no differences according to gender.
Conclusion
The new findings shed light on the evolution of the working conditions and health of the wage-earning population in Spain over the last 11 years. The stratification by gender and occupational group is relevant, since it allows a detailed analysis of the social disparities in the associations between psychosocial risks and mental health. The most vulnerable groups can be identified and preventive measures developed at source.
Abstract Purpose The Educació en Alimentació (EdAl) program conducted over 28 months in primary school children reduced obesity (OB) prevalence in boys and increased voluntary physical activity (PA). ...The continued benefit after cessation of EdAl is unknown. We assessed the changes in OB prevalence and healthy lifestyle in 11- to 13-year-old adolescents, the age group that had complete inclusion data available 2 years after the EdAl program's conclusion. Methods Adolescents (n = 421 intervention; n = 198 control) with data at baseline and 2-year follow-up were recruited. Analyses included body mass index (BMI), BMI z -score, and lifestyle data (from questionnaires). Results Between baseline and 2-year follow-up, OB prevalence was reduced (−5.5%; p < .01) and BMI z -score (−.29; p < .001) in intervention compared with control group. BMI z -score was effectively reduced in intervention in both genders: −.26 units in boys and −.32 units in girls, compared with control group. The ≥4 hours/week after-school PA was increased significantly by 13.1% in adolescents of intervention group compared with control group ( p = .023); a tendency toward increased PA in intervention girls was observed ( p = .062). At 2-year follow-up, participating in ≥4 hours/week after-school PA (odds ratio, .240; p = .002) and daily fruit consumption (odds ratio, .447; p = .025) were protective factors against OB, whereas ≤2 hours/week after-school PA was a risk factor for OB. Conclusions At 2-year follow-up, the EdAl program induced a lowering of BMI z -score and OB prevalence, compared with control group. After-school PA practice can be stimulated in primary school as part of a healthy lifestyle and maintained subsequently despite cessation of the intervention program.
Abstract
Background
Most cost-effectiveness analyses in the context of cervical cancer prevention involve the use of mathematical models to simulate HPV infection, cervical disease and prevention ...strategies. However, it is common for professionals who would need to perform these analyses to not be familiar with the models. This work introduces the
Online Cost-Effectiveness ANalysis
tool, featuring an easy-to-use web interface providing health professionals, researchers and decision makers involved in cervical cancer prevention programmes with a useful instrument to conduct complex cost-effectiveness analyses, which are becoming an essential tool as an approach for supporting decision-making that involves important trade-offs.
Results
The users can run cost-effectiveness evaluations of cervical cancer prevention strategies without deep knowledge of the underlying mathematical model or any programming language, obtaining the most relevant costs and health outcomes in a user-friendly format. The results provided by the tool are consistent with the existing literature.
Conclusions
Having such a tool will be an asset to the cervical cancer prevention community, providing researchers with an easy-to-use instrument to conduct cost-effectiveness analyses.
The aim of this paper is to examine the relationships between three domains of job insecurity, namely job loss insecurity, insecurity regarding working conditions and labor market insecurity, taking ...into account both their cognitive and affective components. Relationships with other related factors such as worker’s sociodemographic characteristics, household economic circumstances and occupational factors related to job insecurity are also shown. In order to achieve this we have used log-linear models and multiple correspondence analysis. By considering three domains and two components of perceived insecurity simultaneously, relevant aspects not previously observed of the relationships between them and related factors are revealed. This cross-sectional study of the wage-earning population in Spain in 2016 introduces therefore an element of complexity in the discussion on job insecurity which it would be advisable to incorporate in future research.
Abstract
Background
The main goal of this work is to estimate the actual number of cases of COVID-19 in Spain in the period 31 January 2020 to 01 June 2020 by Autonomous Communities. Based on these ...estimates, this work allows us to accurately re-estimate the lethality of the disease in Spain, taking into account unreported cases.
Methods
A hierarchical Bayesian model recently proposed in the literature has been adapted to model the actual number of COVID-19 cases in Spain.
Results
The results of this work show that the real load of COVID-19 in Spain in the period considered is well above the data registered by the public health system. Specifically, the model estimates show that, cumulatively until 1 June 2020, there were 2 425 930 cases of COVID-19 in Spain with characteristics similar to those reported (95% credibility interval: 2 148 261–2 813 864), from which were actually registered only 518 664.
Conclusions
Considering the results obtained from the second wave of the Spanish seroprevalence study, which estimates 2 350 324 cases of COVID-19 produced in Spain, in the period of time considered, it can be seen that the estimates provided by the model are quite good. This work clearly shows the key importance of having good quality data to optimize decision-making in the critical context of dealing with a pandemic.
Encouraging healthy lifestyles in children is a challenge. This project aimed to improve lifestyles of younger peers by engaging adolescent creators (ACs) to design and implement peer-led and social ...marketing (SM) health-promoting activities.
A 10-month parallel-cluster randomised controlled school-based pilot study was performed in disadvantaged neighbourhoods in Reus (Spain) spanning two academic years (2015-2016/2016-2017). Eight primary schools (n=375 children) and four high schools (n=94ACs) were randomly placed in the intervention group. The 94 ACs (12-14 years) designed and implemented four SM activities for their younger peers (9-11 years). Eight primary schools (n=327 children) and three high schools (n=98 adolescents) served as the control group and received no intervention. Primary (physical activity and fruit consumption) and secondary outcomes (screen time, vegetables, soft drinks, sweets and fast food consumptions) were assessed with validated questionnaires at baseline and at the end of the study.
After 10 months, fruit consumption and physical activity were maintained in the children who consumed ≥1 fruit/day and spent ≥6 hours/week physical activity. However, compared with the controls, the intervention significantly increased the physical activity of girls to 15.6 min/week, whereas the percentage of girls who consumed sweets, soft drinks and fast food decreased significantly by 8.4%, 14.5% and 5.9%, respectively. Additionally, the percentage of ≥2 hour/weekday of screen time by boys decreased significantly by 8.2%.
The European Youth Tackling Obesity-Kids, SM and peer-led intervention, effectively increased physical activity hours/week in girls, but was not effective in improving the percentage of children who consumed the recommended fruit. Moreover, the percentages of girls who consumed sweets, soft drinks and fast food and boys screen time decreased.
NCT02702336; Pre-results.
To explore the decisional process of people living with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) currently enrolled in antiretroviral clinical trials.
Cross-sectional retrospective study. Outcome variables ...were reasons to participate, perceived decisional role (Control Preference Scale), the Decisional Conflict Scale and the Decisional Regret Scale. Descriptive statistics were calculated, and associations among these variables and with sociodemographic and clinical characteristics were analyzed with non-parametric techniques.
Main reasons to participate were gratitude towards Fundación Huesped (47%), the doctor's recommendation (32%), and perceived difficulty to access treatment in a public hospital (28%). Most patients thought that they made their decision alone (54.8%) or collaboratively with the physician (43%). Decisional conflict was low, with only some conflict in the support subscale (median=16.67). Education was the only significant correlate of the total decisional conflict score (higher in less educated patients; p=0.018), whereas education, recent diagnosis, living alone, lower age, being man and doctor's recommendation to go to Fundación Huésped related to higher conflict in different subscales. Nobody regretted to participate.
The decision making regarding participation in HIV trials, from the perspective of participants, was made respecting their autonomy and with very low decisional conflict. Currently, patients show no signs of regret. However, even in this favorable context, results highlight the necessity of enhancing the decision support in more vulnerable patients (e.g., less educated, recently diagnosed or with less social support), thus warranting equity in the quality of the decision making process.
Explorar el proceso de decisión de las personas que viven con el virus de la inmunodeficiencia humana (VIH) y participan en ensayos clínicos de antirretrovirales.
Estudio retrospectivo transversal. Las variables de resultado fueron los motivos para participar, el rol de participación percibido (Escala de preferencia de control), la Escala de conflicto decisional y la Escala de arrepentimiento decisional. Se realizó una estadística descriptiva y se establecieron asociaciones entre estas variables con variables sociodemográficas y clínicas usando técnicas no paramétricas.
Las razones para participar fueron la gratitud hacia la Fundación Huésped (47%), la recomendación del médico (32%) y la dificultad percibida para acceder al tratamiento en un hospital público (28%). Los pacientes opinan que tomaron su decisión solos (54,8%) o en colaboración con el médico (43%). El conflicto en la decisión fue bajo, aunque hubo cierto conflicto en la subescala de apoyo (mediana=16,67). La educación se relacionó con el conflicto en la decisión (mayor en pacientes con menor nivel educativo; p=0.018), mientras que la educación, el diagnóstico reciente, vivir solo, la menor edad y la recomendación del médico de ir a la Fundación Huésped se relacionaron con un mayor conflicto en diferentes subescalas. Nadie se arrepintió de su participación.
Desde la perspectiva de los participantes, en el proceso de toma de decisiones se respetó su autonomía, hubo poco conflicto decisional y no aparecen signos de arrepentimiento. A pesar de este contexto favorable, los resultados destacan la necesidad de mejorar el apoyo a las decisiones en las personas más vulnerables (con menos educación, de diagnóstico reciente o con menos apoyo social) para garantizar la equidad en la calidad del proceso de decisión.
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