Stress
Work-related stress is the harmful physical
or psychological reaction that occurs when people are subject to
excessive work demands or expectations.
Stress symptoms
Mental and physical
symptoms
Defining cases of work-related
stress
HSE figures show that in Great Britain:
- stress is the second most commonly reported condition in the
self-reported work related illnesses
- an estimated 428,000 workers in 2011/12 suffered from
stress caused or made worse by their current or past work
- on average, each person who was suffering from work-related
stress took an estimated 24 days off in 2011/12
- an estimated 10.4 million working days in 2011/12 were lost in
total due to work-related stress, depression or anxiety.
Find out more on the HSE
website.
The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work report,
Stress at work – facts and figures, provides comparisons of the
prevalence of stress at work across European countries, as well as
differences in stress according to age, gender, sector and
occupation, and the associated costs.
Stress symptoms
Stress affects different people in different ways, and everyone
has a different method of dealing with it. The chemicals that are
released by your body as a result of stress can build up over time
and cause various mental and physical symptoms.
Mental and physical symptoms
- Anger
- Depression
- Anxiety
- Changes in behaviour
- Food cravings
- Lack of appetite
- Frequent crying
- Difficulty sleeping (mental)
- Feeling tired
- Difficulty concentrating
- Chest pains
- Constipation or diarrhoea
- Cramps or muscle spasms
- Dizziness
- Fainting spells
- Nail biting
- Nervous twitches
- Pins and needles
- Feeling restless
- A tendency to sweat
- Loss of interest in sex
- Breathlessness
- Muscular aches
- Difficulty sleeping (physical)
For more information, see
NHS Choices.
Defining cases of work-related stress
Defining a case of
work-related stress is complicated and is the subject of a
128-page report commissioned by the HSE. The conclusion drawn from
the report is that no simple and universal case definition is
possible, largely because of the complex nature of work-related
stress. The report suggests that stress should not be treated as an
‘illness’ but rather as a ‘process’, where the emotional experience
of stress largely resulted from exposure to psychosocial hazards at
work, and in the worst cases led to impairments of physical and
psychological health of clinical and behavioural significance.
In terms of determining the presence of a case, the five
critical elements of an epidemiological case assessment framework
are:
- the report of experience of work-related stress (or
equivalent)
- evidence of exposure to psychosocial hazards associated with
work
- evidence of the onset of a new condition of clinical
significance or of the worsening of an existing condition of
similar level of significance
- evidence of a significant consequence, either in terms of
absence from work or change in frequency of visits to a general
practitioner (or treatment for ill health)
- lack of evidence of any major confounding individual difference
or circumstance.
View the full report on the HSE
website.
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Stress | Musculoskeletal disorders | Skin disorders |
Inhalation
disorders | Non work-related
conditions