Suchergebnisse

Musculoskeletal diagnoses account for the majority of cases of reduced work capacity. This article investigates lay persons' strategies in relation to work and musculoskeletal disorders. Twenty interviews were conducted and analysed using grounded theory. A typology of self‐presentations was developed. The interviewees' self‐presentations revealed a strong sense of a 'duty to work'. This sense of duty took four different forms, leading us to categorise persons expressing particular forms as workaholics, work manics, workhorses or relaxed workers. Relaxed workers seem to have the best prognosis for recovery as they had a confident self‐agency and worked to fulfil their own needs rather than those of others. This was in contrast to work manics, with an uncertain self‐agency and driven to work by others' needs. In conclusion, awareness of such linguistic forms as self‐attributions and idiomatic phrases provides an opportunity to identify and talk about individual's self‐agency and driving forces in the recovery process.

As injuries are the main health threat for young adults (18–29 years) in industrial countries, a better understanding of injury risk is needed for this population. Using the Critical Incident Technique, this study explores how young people experience situations that have the potential to cause physical injury (i.e., near-injury situations). Clearly, understanding how and why near-injury situations arise can be used to develop strategies to help prevent severe injury. Content analysis was used to categorize the characteristics of the experiences into <em>unexpected risk in ordinary tasks</em>, <em>duty first</em>, and <em>price for learning</em>. Young adults' exposures to new or unusual environmental conditions, especially in unexpected risk in ordinary tasks, should be considered when planning injury prevention strategies. A combination of individual, social, and contextual demands and expectations was identified in both work- and sports-related experiences with near-injury situations. The price for learning, which arises from the added risk involved in learning situations, is another condition that was identified and requires further attention. The Critical Incident Technique proved to be a useful method for identifying near-injury situations that might otherwise have been difficult to recall. Young adults' efforts to display their ability to handle difficult situations at work and in their everyday lives was identified as a major contributor to near-injury situations.

AbstractTo study health inequalities between native and immigrant Swedes, we investigated differences in self‐rated health (SRH), mental wellbeing (MW), common symptoms (CS), and persistent illness (PI), and if socioeconomic status (SES), negative status inconsistency, or social support could account for such differences. A secondary analysis was conducted on questionnaire data from a random adult population sample of 4,023 individuals and register data from Statistics Sweden. χ2 tests and binary logistic regressions were used to identify health differences and study these after accounting for explanatory variables. Compared with natives, immigrants more commonly reported negative status inconsistency, poorer SES, and poorer social support as well as poor SRH, very poor MW, and high level of CS but not PI. Significant differences were accounted for by work‐related factors and social support. We encourage future research to address how pre‐ and peri‐migration factors relate to immigrants' post‐migration SES, social support, and health status.
Policy Implications


Given the relationship between work‐related factors (employment status, hours worked per week, and income) and all health outcomes in this study, labour market interventions that facilitate the integration of immigrants into the labour market, and into occupations that better correspond with their capacity, will arguably have public health benefits.

Feelings of loneliness was, in our study, important in accounting for immigrants' poorer self‐rated health compared with natives'. Therefore, we endorse interventions that facilitate immigrants' social networking and integration and thereby reduce feelings of loneliness.

Common physical and mental symptoms may be important indicators of health and we, thus, suggest these to be taken into account when developing ill‐health prevention programmes.

Background: The mental healthcare treatment gap (mhcGAP) in adult populations has been substantiated across Europe. This study formed part of MentALLY, a research project funded by the European Commission, which aimed to gather qualitative empirical evidence to support the provision of European mental healthcare that provides effective treatment to all adults who need it. Methods: Seven focus groups were conducted with 49 health professionals (HPs), including psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, general practitioners, and psychiatric nurses who worked in health services in Belgium, Cyprus, Greece, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden. The focus group discussions centered on the barriers and facilitators to providing quality care to people with mild, medium, and severe mental health problems. Analyses included deductively and inductively driven coding procedures. Cross-country consensus was obtained by summarizing findings in the form of a fact sheet which was shared for triangulation by all the MentALLY partners. Results: The results converged into two overarching themes: (1) Minding the treatment gap: the availability and accessibility of Mental Health Services (MHS). The mhcGAP gap identified is composed of different elements that constitute the barriers to care, including bridging divides in care provision, obstacles in facilitating access via referrals and creating a collaborative 'chain of care'. (2) Making therapeutic practice relevant by providing a broad-spectrum of integrated and comprehensive services that value person-centered care comprised of authenticity, flexibility and congruence. Conclusions: The mhcGAP is comprised of the following barriers: a lack of funding, insufficient capacity of human resources, inaccessibility to comprehensive services and a lack of availability of relevant treatments. The facilitators to the provision of MHC include using collaborative models of primary, secondary and prevention-oriented mental healthcare. Teamwork in providing care was considered to be a more effective and efficient use of resources. HPs believe that the use of e-mental health and emerging digital technologies can enhance care provision. Facilitating access to a relevant continuum of community-based care that is responsive coordinated and in line with people's needs throughout their lives is an essential aspect of optimal care provision.