Although the number of iodine-deficient countries has been reduced by almost 50 % over the last decade, it still remains a frequently misunderstood health problem. The most devastating effects of iodine deficiency occur during fetal development and childhood, periods in which sufficient iodine delivery remains critical. Besides the determination of thyroid ...

Obtaining valid accounts of professionals' thinking is dependent upon experts' capacity for self-insight. Self-insight has implications for developing professional decision making, facilitating education and promoting agreement among therapists. The aim of this study was to examine occupational therapists' self-insight into their referral prioritisation policies. A total of 40 occupational therapists ...

As the baby boomer generation, born 1945-1963, begins its transition to retirement, what might be the position of volunteering within their new life structure? Using retired occupational therapists as a purposive sample (n = 50), this survey provides a description of the volunteer experience in three distinct phases: 1) Pre-retirement contemplation and ...

Little is known about the quality of occupational health care provided to National Health Service (NHS) staff. We designed the first national clinical audits of occupational health care in England. We chose to audit depression and back pain as health care workers have high levels of both conditions compared with ...

The aim of this study was to examine the relationship between occupational category and 3 health-related behaviors: participation in leisure-time physical activity, active transport (AT) and occupational sitting in a sample of employed Australian adults. A random, cross-sectional sample of 592 adults aged 18 to 71 years completed a telephone ...

The association between socioeconomic status (SES) and health has been widely documented. However, the role of occupation in this association is not clear because occupation is less often used than income and education as an indicator of SES, especially in the United States. This may be caused by the ambiguity ...

Background Panel studies on changes of occupational class differences in health have given varying results. The aim of this study was to examine changes of occupational class differences in physical functioning and the factors that explain these changes. Methods A cohort of middle-aged employees of the City of Helsinki was ...

Emerging evidence suggests that sedentary behavior (i.e., time spent sitting) may be negatively associated with health. The aim of this study was to systematically review the evidence on associations between occupational sitting and health risks. Studies were identified in March-April 2009 by literature searches in PubMed, PsycINFO, CENTRAL, CINAHL, EMBASE, ...

Participation in occupations of everyday life, such as self-care, work, and leisure, contribute to health and well-being. Obesity has been shown to influence health-related quality of life, but it is unclear how obesity influences participation in specific occupations. To describe the lived experience of adults with class III obesity and ...

Musculoskeletal disorders are one of the leading causes of work related ill health and sickness absence. Those who drive as part of their job may be at particular risk, with evidence suggesting that prolonged exposure to driving is associated with increased absence from work due to low back pain. Business ...

In the absence of occupational exposure limits, control banding may be a useful strategy for assessing and controlling occupational hazards as part of a comprehensive safety and health program.

The Multispecialty Occupational Health Group (MSOHG), formed in 2005, is an informal coalition of societies representing professionals who work in, or are concerned with, interventional fluoroscopy. The group's long-term goals are to improve occupational health and operator and staff safety in the interventional laboratory while maintaining quality patient care and ...

The Multispecialty Occupational Health Group (MSOHG), formed in 2005, is an informal coalition of societies representing professionals who work in or are concerned with interventional fluoroscopy. The group's long-term goals are to improve occupational health and operator and staff safety in the interventional laboratory while maintaining quality patient care and ...

Occupational health activities based on a health promotion philosophy and focused on primary and secondary prevention were introduced at a Japanese newspaper company where restructuring had occurred. Japanese metabolic syndrome diagnostic standards were used to determine changes in certain lifestyle disease risk factors over 10 years. The amount of change ...

Dementia is now a major public health issue in low- and middle-income countries, and strategies for primary prevention are needed. This study aimed to estimate the proportion of cases of dementia attributable to illiteracy, non-skilled occupation and low income, which are common, potentially modifiable social adversities that occur along the ...

Concerns have been raised about the capacity of the health workforce to meet increasing future health care demands. Strategies aimed at improving workforce supply, at least in Australia, are focused heavily on education (ie, increasing the number of training places in key health professions) and recruitment (ie, recruiting overseas-trained health ...

Health anxiety is a ubiquitous experience that arises when bodily sensations or changes are believed to be indicative of a serious disease. Severe expressions of health anxiety are most often classified as hypochondriasis in the current DSM-IV-TR; however, various alternative classification schemas have been proposed for the DSM-V. Regardless of ...

Awareness of occupational safety and health (OSH) plays an important role in the prevention of occupational injuries and diseases. Following the enactment of the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) in 1994, various programmes have been implemented by different agencies to increase awareness and knowledge of OSH in the workplace, ...

Objectives To analyse the associations between socio-economic status (SES), measured using occupation, and self-reported health, and to examine the contribution of various material, occupational and psychosocial factors to social inequalities in health in Europe. Methods This study was based on data from the European Quality of Life Survey (EQLS) carried ...

The current emphasis on occupational exposures to diacetyl has led to new research on its effects. We evaluated whether the data are sufficient to support a transition from a hazard-based risk management approach to a quantitative occupational risk assessment approach, characterized by developing a health-based occupational exposure limit (OEL). Inhalation ...

BACKGROUND: Research is essential for evidence-based practice yet many health professionals do not have enough time to find research. Studies relevant to occupational therapists can be particularly difficult to find. Most search engines are broad and return a large number of irrelevant articles. Occupational Therapy Systematic Evaluation of Evidence (OTseeker) ...

Panic attack symptoms mimic other serious health problems and have implications for the occupational health nurse. In the workplace, the results of panic disorder may lead to poor job performance and affect the morale and effectiveness of the entire workplace.

Occupational exposure to active pharmaceutical ingredients in a manufacturing or laboratory environmental can cause unintended health effects in workers handling these compounds. Occupational health professionals in the pharmaceutical industry have responded to this hazard recognition by employing strategies for the risk evaluation and management of potent APIs, otherwise known by ...

Occupational asthma is the most common work-related respiratory disease in the UK. Individuals whose work potentially puts them at risk include those exposed to laboratory animals. Workplace health surveillance programmes aim to minimize these health risks but are recognized to be challenging to implement effectively. To evaluate the efficacy of ...

In a paper that won the "Best Paper" award at the Institute of Hospital Engineering Australia's (IHEA) 2009 conference in Queensland, Ken Liddell, MIHEA, of the Facility Coordination Unit at NSW (New South Wales) Health, draws on his own experience to consider some of the challenges, especially in gleaning all ...

From January to July of 2009, an investigation was conducted on Occupational Health in Nepal. An evaluation of occupational health and safety in Nepal is compared to that in other South Asian countries. The analysis includes an evaluation of what is in place and a multi-tiered recommendation to define and ...

Current health policy places emphasis on community-based health care and it is expected that there will be an increase in the number of people receiving care in community settings. This study aimed to examine the profile and scope of practice of occupational therapists working in Victorian community health settings and ...

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: There is mounting evidence that the presence of airborne chemicals that produce odor and irritation can be a significant impediment to a productive and healthy workforce, even among individuals without chemical sensitivity. RECENT FINDINGS: Studies investigating odor and irritant-induced symptoms in occupational environments suggest that poor indoor ...

The provision of occupational health (OH) services to the UK population is limited and concentrated in certain industries. Occupational physicians (OPs) therefore see a different subset of the population than general practitioners (GPs) and their recognition of work-related ill health may differ. To examine how reports submitted by OPs and ...

BACKGROUND: Global migration has dramatically increased over the past decade and is at an all-time high, approaching 200 million persons per year. Demographics and economic interdependence suggest that immigration will continue for the near future at record high levels. METHODS: A review of the few studies that have investigated occupational ...

Abstract This study investigates the theoretical assumption of the Value and Meaning in Occupations model. The aim was to explore the relationship between occupational value, perceived meaning, and subjective health in a sample of individuals of working age, 50 men and 250 women. Frequency of experienced values in occupations was ...

Occupational exposures now account for 20% of adult onset asthma. Overall incidence has not declined, but recognition of the problem and substitutions have resulted in dramatic reductions in some causes of occupational asthma, particularly latex and glutaraldehyde in healthcare workers. Newer at risk workers include cleaners and those exposed to ...

We examined how the deregulation of South Korea's labor laws during the country's 1997 to 1998 economic crisis affected occupational safety and health. Although the economic index improved after the reforms, the total injury rate declined slowly and the incidence of occupational disease increased. The withdrawal of support for occupational ...

Integrating general health initiatives into established occupational health programs may be an effective way of contributing more broadly to employee health. Objective assessment of the success of such initiatives is needed, but is often difficult to carry out because of their voluntary nature. A cohort of 24,586 wage employees, 35+ years ...

Public concerns relative to adverse consequences of large-scale livestock production have been increasingly voiced since the late 1960s. Numerous regional, national, and international conferences have been held on the subject since 1994. This paper provides a review of the literature on the community and occupational health concerns of large-scale livestock ...

Teamwork has been emphasised as a key feature of health service reform, essential for safe, efficient and patient-centred care. Bringing together literatures from the sociology of healthcare and organizational theory, we examine how the teamwork phenomenon plays out in practice. Drawing upon material from two ethnographic studies, conducted in an ...

To review the current published available research into the impact of voice training on the vocal quality of professional voice users, to provide implications for vocal health and recommendations for further research. Literature review with a systematic approach. A systematic search of the literature was conducted using electronic databases and ...

Ensuring the safety of personnel working in health care environments can be challenging and requires a multifaceted approach to target reductions in occupational exposures to blood-borne pathogens, such as hepatitis B or hepatitis C. This article reviews the epidemiology of occupational exposures to hepatitis B and hepatitis C in health ...

Increasingly, the occupational health community is turning its attention to the effects of work on previously underserved populations, and researchers have identified many examples of disparities in occupational health outcomes. However, the occupational health status of some underserved worker populations is not described due to limitations in existing surveillance systems. ...

Significant problems in health care, such as access block and long waiting lists for elective surgery, have led to calls for keeping hospital occupancy at no more than 85%. It is elementary queueing theory that a finite-capacity system with variable demand cannot sustain both full utilisation and full availability. However, ...

BACKGROUND: Occupational health and safety (OHS) is considered one of the most important factors for a sustainable development; however, it is often considered a luxury by decision-makers. This article compares OHS systems of 18 countries at different stages of development. METHODS: In an international summer school, structure of the national ...

The investment of time and self to develop therapeutic relationships with clients appears incongruent with today's time-constrained health care system, yet bridging the gap of these incongruencies is the challenge therapists face to provide high-quality, client-centered, occupation-based treatment. This case report illustrates a shift in approach from biomechanical to occupational ...

Seafarers are exposed to a high diversity of occupational health hazards onboard ships. Objective: The aim of this article is to present a survey of the current, most important hazards in seafaring including recommendations on measures how to deal with these problems. Methods: The review is based on maritime expert ...

The evolving theory of occupational justice links the concept to social justice and to concerns for a justice of difference: a justice that recognizes occupational rights to inclusive participation in everyday occupations for all persons in society, regardless of age, ability, gender, social class, or other differences. The purpose of ...

ABSTRACT: Seafarers play an important role in the transmission of communicable diseases. The aim of the present study is to draw information and identify possible gaps on occupational health practices related to seafarers sailing on ships within the European Union Member States (EU MS) with focus on communicable diseases. A ...

OBJECTIVES: The aim of the study was to develop a model of basic occupational health services (BOHS) in Baoan, which could provide occupational health services (OHS) universally for workers and control occupational hazards. METHODS: Steps involved in the BOHS strategy included construction of the BOHS system, capacity building, health training ...

Although numerous lists of "citation classics" have been compiled across a variety of scientific fields, few have included articles from environmental and occupational health (EOH). This investigation sought to identify and analyze the most highly cited articles ever published in the Journal of Industrial Hygiene (1919-1935), the Journal of Industrial ...

Guidelines for occupational physicians are increasing in number. Their quality and content is varied and they may even provide conflicting recommendations. Earlier studies show that guidelines directed at professionals in occupational health use scientific evidence unsystematically or inadequately. This article assesses the guidelines of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health ...

This article alerts occupational health nurses to the issuance of new guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Protection regarding respiratory protection when in contact with patients with confirmed or suspected H1N1 virus infection. Additionally, guidance from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration is provided for situations in which ...

For purposes of developing effective occupational health nursing interventions, the authors clarified the long-term changes in health care data of employees in different departments at Company A, a Japanese newspaper company. Company A's clerical, sales, editing, and computer departments did not receive special occupational health activities; rather, health management centered ...