Workplace flexibility is associated with lower risk of cardiovascular disease — Harvard Gazette

Increasing workplace flexibility may lower employees’ risk of cardiovascular disease, according to a new study led by Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Pennsylvania State University.

In workplaces that have implemented interventions aimed at reducing conflicts between employees’ work and personal and family lives, employees with higher baseline cardiometabolic risk, especially older employees, are more likely to develop cardiovascular disease. Researchers observed a reduction in risk equivalent to 5 to 10 years of age. Associated cardiometabolic changes.

The study was published Wednesday in the American Journal of Public Health. He was one of the first companies to assess whether changes in the work environment can affect cardiometabolic risk.

“This study shows that working conditions are an important social determinant of health,” said co-first author and Thomas D. Cabot Professor of Public Policy and Epidemiology at the Harvard Chan School of Public Policy at Harvard University. said Lisa Berkman, director of the Population and Development Research Center.

“We found that reducing stressful work environments and work-family conflict reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease among more vulnerable employees, without negatively impacting productivity. Our findings may have particularly significant implications for low- and middle-wage workers, who traditionally have less control over their schedules and job demands and where health inequalities are more acute,” Berkman said. said.

As part of the work, family, and health network, researchers designed a workplace intervention aimed at increasing work-life balance. Supervisors were trained on strategies to show support for employees’ personal and family lives alongside their work performance, and supervisors and their teams were also trained. Employees participated in hands-on training and discovered new ways to give employees more control over their schedules and tasks.

Researchers randomly assigned the intervention to work units and sites within an IT company with 555 participating employees and a long-term care company with 973 participating employees. The IT workforce consisted of male and female high- and mid-wage technical workers. Long-term care staff consisted primarily of female, low-wage direct caregivers. No other units or sites were assigned to intervene, so operations continued as usual.

The 1,528 employees in the experimental and control groups had their systolic blood pressure, BMI, glycated hemoglobin, smoking status, HDL cholesterol, and total cholesterol recorded at the beginning of the study and 12 months later. The researchers used this information to calculate each employee’s cardiometabolic risk score (CRS), with higher scores indicating a higher estimated risk of cardiovascular disease within 10 years.

The study found that workplace interventions did not have a significant overall impact on employees’ risk scores. However, researchers observed a decline in scores, especially among employees with high baseline CRS. Employees of IT and care companies showed lower scores equivalent to 5.5 and 10.3 years of age-related change, respectively. Age also played a role, with employees aged 45 and older with higher baseline CRS more likely to experience attrition than younger employees.

“This intervention is designed to change workplace culture over time with the aim of reducing conflict between employees’ work and personal lives and ultimately improving employee health.” said co-lead author Orfeu Buxton, professor of biobehavioral health and professor of biobehavioral health. Penn State University Sleep, Health, and Society Collaborative Laboratory. “We know that changes like this can improve employee health and should be implemented more widely.”

Koga Hayami, a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University’s Center for Population and Development Research, is also a co-author.

Funding for this study was provided by the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. National Institute on Aging (grant U01AG027669); Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research; National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (grants U01OH008788, U01HD059773); and National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (grant R01-HL107240). Additional funding was provided by the University of Minnesota College of Arts and Sciences, the McKnight Foundation, the William T. Grant Foundation, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, and the Administration for Children and Families.