Affiliations: Division of Occupational Medicine, Department of
Public Health Sciences, Karolinska Institutet, Norrbacka, SE-171 76 Stockholm,
Sweden | Stockholm Center for Public Health, Department of
Occupational and Environmental Health, Stockholm County Council, Stockholm,
Sweden | National Institute for Working Life, Stockholm,
Sweden | Section of Personal Injury Prevention, Department of
Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden
Abstract: Musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) have a multifactorial etiology.
Therefore, a holistic approach to identifying target groups for
primary/secondary prevention is essential. In this study, an exploratory
person-oriented approach was applied, using cluster analysis of variables
related to physical and psychosocial work conditions, and conditions in the
private sphere, on a data set of 1,341 Swedish women and men who had not sought
care for MSDs the 6 months preceding enrollment in the study. Three groups at
risk and five "healthy" groups regarding MSDs were identified. Two of the
risk groups had a strained situation regarding psychosocial work conditions or
domestic/family conditions, respectively. The majority of individuals in these
groups were women. The third risk group had a strained situation regarding both
physical and psychosocial work conditions. This group consisted largely of men
working in male-dominated jobs. The five healthy groups had low/moderate
metabolic demands at work, and all of them having high proportions of subjects
with moderate to high education, and fairly even distributions of men and
women. In conclusion, the results indicate that gender-specific working and
living conditions are associated with an increased risk for MSDs. The
identification of these subgroups in the population may facilitate a selective
prevention approach.
Keywords: Prevention, neck/shoulder disorder, low back disorder, cluster analysis, gender
