Social workers have long hours and stress[/caption]Editor--What are the risk factors for depression? According to recent scientific findings, what happens at work can lead to depression, and these are some of the risk factors at your job.
Americans are working longer at their jobs, and the long hours and high job demands are taking their toll on the mood of Americans at work.
As employers demand more, after cutting back on numbers of employees, the extra work falls on the remaining employees. These employees feel the pressure and with many workers the stress becomes a trigger for depression. Targeting the problem means reducing those risks , according to a report by Drs. Takahashi Amagasa and Takeo Nakayama of Kyoto University School of Public Health.
Researchers also found that the more workers remained in the long hour-overworked status, the worse the risk of depression. Scientists tell us in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, "By targeting LHO, especially changes in LHO status, mental health measures that effectively reduce the occurrence of major depressive disorder will become possible by controlling factors in the occupational environment."
The Mayo Clinic provides a listing of additional risk factors, which combined with those at work can create major influences on the rate of depression in the population as well as individual risks. That’s particularly true given the numbers of people with diabetes and hypertension that continue to grow in the normal population. Some of these risk factors include:
- Having biological relatives with depression
- Being a woman
- Having traumatic experiences as a child
- Having family members or friends who have been depressed
- Experiencing stressful life events, such as the death of a loved one
- Having few friends or other personal relationships
- Recently having given birth (postpartum depression)
- Having been depressed previously
- Having a serious illness, such as cancer, diabetes, heart disease, Alzheimer's or HIV/AIDS
- Having certain personality traits, such as having low self-esteem and being overly dependent, self-critical or pessimistic
- Abusing alcohol, nicotine or illicit drugs
- Taking certain high blood pressure medications, sleeping pills or certain other medications (Talk to your doctor before stopping any medication you think could be affecting your mood.)
According to the National Institute of Mental Health depression is the most prevalent mental illness in the general population.
