High Work Load in Nurses Associated with Ischemic Heart Disease

Nurses who believe they are under increased pressure at work have a significantly increased risk of developing ischemic heart disease (IHD), according to a new study.

Researchers at Glostrup University Hospital (Denmark) prospectively studied the effect of work pressure and job influence on the 15-year incidence of IHD in women participating in the Danish Nurse Cohort Study. A total of 12,116 participants (age 45-64) were examined in 1993 using a questionnaire, and were followed by individual linkage in the Danish national register of hospital discharges to the beginning of 2008. Work pressure, job influence, occupational characteristics, demographic factors, and known biological and behavioral risk factors for IHD were collected at baseline.

The researchers found that during the follow-up, 580 participants were hospitalized with IHD; this included 369 cases of angina pectoris, 138 myocardial infarctions (MIs), and 73 other IHD events. In the fully adjusted model, nurses who reported work pressure to be much too high had a 1.4-fold increased risk of incident IHD--independent of traditional coronary risk factors--when compared to nurses who reported work pressure to be suitable; a tendency towards a dose dependent response effect was found. Age-stratified analysis showed that this effect was significant only among nurses who were younger than 51 years of age at baseline. No association was found between job influence and IHD. The study was published in the May 2010 issue of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.

"This study adds to the previous body of evidence suggesting harmful effects of excessive psychological demands at work on cardiac health but is one among very few that demonstrates the effect among women,” concluded lead author Karen Allesoe, and colleagues of the Glostrup University Hospital research center for prevention and health. "Having work pressure that was much too high was a significant predictor of IHD even when angina pectoris was excluded. Additional work should be carried out to identify factors contributing to the perceived high work pressure.”

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Glostrup University Hospital