Perceptions of health and risk management among home care workers in Sweden

Figures & data

Figure 1. Process flow chart for the participatory risk management model.

Table 2. Results on working conditions, personal and participative risk management activities and health-related factors

	Overall study group (n = 133)
	Score range	Alpha	Mean±SD	% ‘high’*
Working conditions
Physical job demands	6–20	–	13·2±2·4	38
High levels of strain imposed by work (yes)	–	–		15
Psychosocial job demands	1–4	0·71	2·5±0·4	23
High decision-making authority	1–4	0·64	2·8±0·6	56
Skill discretion	1–4	0·62	3·6±0·5	96
Support from supervisor	1–5	–	3·7±0·9	64
Support from co-workers	1–5	–	3·9±0·9	74
General level of safety	1–5	–	3·2±0·6	29
Risk management activities
Perceived self-efficacy	1–5	0·70	4·5±0·4	90
Participative safety behaviour:	1–3	–	–	23
Personal safety behaviour:	1–7	0·86	5·4±0·9	38
Occasions not possible to comply with safety regulations:	1–5	–	2·8±0·9	18
Health-related factors
Level of general health	1–5	–	4·2±0·7	87
Psychological wellbeing	1–5	0·85	4·2±0·6	76
Level of musculoskeletal wellbeing	1–5	0·83	4·2±0·9	27
Correspondence work ability and physical job demands	1–5	–	4·3±0·7	88
Correspondence work ability and mental job demands	1–5	–	4·4±0·7	90
Positive belief about future ability to work	1, 4, 7	–	6·6±1·0	87

Note: *The cut-off points taken to describe ‘high’ levels of the aspects measured were:

Working conditions: ‘high’ physical job demands ≧14 ; strain = high psychosocial job demands and low decision-making authority ; ‘high’ psychosocial job demands, decision-making authority and skill discretion ≧3 ‘sometimes or often’; ‘high’ support ≧4 ‘most often or always’; and ‘high’ level of safety ≧4 ‘very god or excellent’.

Risk management activities: ‘high’ self-efficacy ≧4 ‘agree partially or fully; participative safety behaviour = 3 ‘always’; personal safety behaviour ≧6 ‘almost always or always’, and number of restricting occasions ≧4 ‘rather often or very often’.

Health-related factors: ‘high’ general health ≧ 4 ‘rather good’ or ‘very good’; ‘high’ psychological wellbeing ≧4 ‘quite often’ or ‘often’; ‘high’ musculoskeletal wellbeing = 5 ‘very seldom or never experiencing pain’; ‘high’ work ability in relation to, physical and mental, job demands ≧4 ‘rather good’ or’ very good’; and ‘high’ positive beliefs = 7 ‘yes, most likely’.

Table 3. Results on differences between the workers’ reports of ‘always’ and ‘never’ participating in the risk management in their own work unit (only variables with statistically significant differences are presented in the table, with the relevant P values)

	Yes always (n = 30)			No, never (n = 13)
		Mean±SD	% ‘high’		Mean±SD	% ‘high’	P
Working conditions
Decision-making authority (scale 1–4)		3·0±0·4	73		2·3±0·7	15	0·001
Support from supervisor (scale 1–5)		3·9±0·9	70		2·7±1·4	38	<0·001
Support from co-workers		4·1±0·9	80		3·3±1·4	46	0·032
General level of safety (scale 1–5)		3·4±0·6	37		2·8±0·8	15	0·006
Risk management activities
Occasions not possible to comply with safety regulations: (scale 1–5)		2·5±0·8	10		3·3±1·3	23	0·018

Note: *The cut-off points taken to describe ‘high’ levels of the aspects measured were: ‘high’ decision-making authority ≧3 ‘sometimes or often’; ‘high’ support ≧4 ‘most often or always’; ‘ high level of safety ≧4 ‘very good or excellent’; ‘high’ number of restraining occasions ≧4 ‘rather often or very often’.

†The differences between the groups were analysed with ANOVA. Significance level <0·05.

Table 1. Characteristics of the participants included in the study (n = 133)

	%	Mean ±SD
Sex
Women	92
Men	8
Age (years)		45·3±10·8
Position
Care aide	43
Assistant nurse	57
Hours worked/week		34·4±4·8
Working full-time >37 hours/week	55
Employment contract
Permanent	93
Temporary	7
Work schedule
Day, evening, weekend	94
Night	6
Seniority in home care service (years)		12·4±8·7
Time in present work unit (years)		8·8±7·5
Work unit size (number of co-workers)		26·1±11·1