Artikel
Do occupational health promotion interventions have an effect on health-related outcomes among employees in small businesses and the self-employed? A systematic review
Suche in Medline nach
Autoren
-
Kristina Willeke
- State Institute of Health I, Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority, Erlangen, Germany; Institute of Clinical Epidemiology and Biometry, University of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany
-
Patrick Janson
- State Institute of Health I, Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority, Erlangen, Germany; Institute of Clinical Epidemiology and Biometry, University of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany
-
Anna Kirchner
- State Institute of Health I, Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority, Erlangen, Germany; Institute of Clinical Epidemiology and Biometry, University of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany
-
Christina Tischer
- State Institute of Health I, Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority, Erlangen, Germany; Finnish Institute of Health and Welfare, Department of Health Security, Kuopio, Finland
-
Arun D’Souza
- State Institute of Health I, Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority, Erlangen, Germany; Institute of Clinical Epidemiology and Biometry, University of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany
-
Peter Heuschmann
- Institute of Clinical Epidemiology and Biometry, University of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany; Clinical Trial Center Würzburg, University Hospital Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany
-
Andreas Zapf
- Bavarian State Ministry of the Environment and Consumer Protection, München, Germany; Pettenkofer School of Public Health, University of Munich, München, Germany
-
Manfred Wildner
- State Institute of Health I, Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority, Erlangen, Germany; Pettenkofer School of Public Health, University of Munich, München, Germany
-
Carolin Stupp
- State Institute of Health I, Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority, Erlangen, Germany
-
Thomas Keil
- State Institute of Health I, Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority, Erlangen, Germany; Institute of Clinical Epidemiology and Biometry, University of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany; Institute of Social Medicine, Epidemiology and Health Economics, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Berlin, Germany
| Veröffentlicht: | 6. September 2024 |
|---|
Gliederung
Text
Background: Self-employed individuals and employees of small and medium-sized enterprises suffer from mental and physical diseases at least as often as employees of large enterprises. However, compared to workers of larger companies it is less clear what health promoting interventions might be beneficial for employees of small businesses and self-employed individuals.
Objective: Our aim was to critically appraise trials investigating health promoting programs among small business workers and self-employed individuals, by means of a systematic review.
Methods: We conducted a systematic search of primary studies in MEDLINE, Web of Science, LIVIVO and the Cochrane library completed by hand search up to November 2021. Following the recommendations of the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions and the PRISMA statement we conducted a critical appraisal of eligible studies by using the Quality Assessment of Controlled Intervention Studies by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (USA).
Results: Our search identified 7,789 publications. We included six trials (three randomized, three non-randomized) from Asia, North America and Australia encompassing 5,854 participants. Five of these were of moderate methodological quality, only one of low quality. Five studies were carried out in small business settings (with less than 300 employees) and one investigated self-employed women.
Some of the psycho-educational lifestyle programs focusing on individual behavior changes or yoga sessions showed benefits in terms of stress reduction and increased physical activity levels among small enterprise employees. An Indian study showed no effect of monthly education sessions among self-employed women on locally relevant hospital admissions such as fever, malaria and diarrhea. Another study found increased levels of physical activity in their intervention group but only among workers of low socioeconomic status, not among those of higher socioeconomic status.
Conclusions: We found some indications that health promoting programs with educational lifestyle interventions or yoga may decrease stress levels and increase physical activity levels among workers of small businesses. However, compared to workers in larger companies it is less clear what health promoting interventions are beneficial for employees in small businesses and the self-employed. Despite an extensive literature search, we identified only three randomized and three non-randomized trials on occupational health promotion and prevention for this target group. There is especially in Europe a huge knowledge gap on evidence-based health promoting interventions for employees in small businesses and the self-employed who represent a large part (more than 50%) of the global workforce.
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.
The authors declare that an ethics committee vote is not required.
