“All work and no play make Jack a dull boy,” has already been a famous adage for those people who are so busy with their jobs that they tend to forget on how to enjoy the things they have work hard for. These people and even those who just love their jobs because they are passionate about their careers might have the risk to meet medical practitioners in medical scrubs and may eventually get sick and then die.
On today’s post, I’ll give you some of the risk factors of the jobs and careers that we have, which may bring us to hospitals and healthcare professionals wearing medical scrubs or even tragically speaking, to a morgue.
Toxic Boss
In many workplaces, there are managers whose effect on others is best described as “toxic.” This person can be so unpleasant that his or her mere presence in the office can cause it to become a stressful environment that stifles productivity. The toxic boss lowers morale, causes a high rate of turnover, and makes the workplace a generally oppressive place — none of which boosts productivity.
Long Hours
A study conducted in 2009 found that workaholics who are the first to show up and the last to leave are frequently given to high levels of burnout and low levels of happiness. This can lead to a bad attitude that can easily go viral and infect the entire office.
Shift Work Hours
Shift work is any work performed outside the boundaries of the standard U.S. work schedule of 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday. This includes night shifts, rotating shifts, or any other non-traditional shift. Shift work has been linked to changes in metabolism that elevate risk for diabetes, heart disease, and obesity. The irregular hours associated with shift work interfere with circadian rhythm — physical, mental, and behavioral changes that follow a roughly 24-hour cycle, according to the National Institute of General Medical Sciences. This interference can cause fatigue and insomnia. As if that weren’t bad enough, the International Agency for Research on Cancer in 2007 took the step of classifying shift work as a probable carcinogen, right up there with engine exhaust.
Lack of Job Security
In 2008, the Center for Work-Life Policy conducted a study called “Sustaining High Performance in Difficult Times.” It found that layoffs and firings are traumatic for the employees left behind, as their levels of trust and loyalty to their employers plummets. Paranoia was rampant, but rather than scare the employees into going the extra mile for their jobs’ sake, the layoffs caused employees to do only the minimum amount of work necessary to not get fired.
Chronic Pain
Hours upon hours spent at a desk can often lead to chronic back pain, and prolonged computer use has been linked to such painful ailments as carpal tunnel syndrome. Offices that don’t invest in ergonomic workspace equipment, such as chairs with adequate lumbar support, risk facing a workforce composed of ibuprofen-popping employees, whose physical ailments significantly slow their work. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, repetitive stress disorders such as carpal tunnel result in absences from work averaging 23 days — a full 11 days longer than injuries related to explosions and fires.
Workplace Incivility
No matter who you are or where you work, there will almost always be one person in your office who gets on your nerves. Most people are able to put those feelings aside, if only for the sake of civility, but there are always going to be employees who see no reason to hold back — sometimes leading to hostile, open confrontations in the workplace. Public confrontations are awkward and stressful for those directly involved, as well as for the co-workers who have to witness them. They impact productivity, hurt morale, and cause other employees’ stress levels to rise. According to the book, “Banishing Burnout: Six Strategies for Improving Your Relationship with Work,” job stress caused by workplace incivility costs employers $300 billion a year in lost productivity.
Commuting
According to the Gallup organization, the average commute from home to work is 23 minutes, but workers with longer commutes reported a larger range of negative physical and emotional conditions. The study found that 19 percent of respondents travelled more than 30 minutes to get to work, while 3 percent reported commutes of more than an hour. Those with longer commutes were more likely to report neck and back pain, high cholesterol, and obesity. Among those with commutes of more than 90 minutes, 40 percent spent most of the day worrying. The study found that the greater an employee’s commute, the more likely it was that productivity would be compromised.
Indoor Air Quality
In 1984, the World Health Organization released a report finding that many newly constructed office buildings had flaws in their heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems. These defects affected indoor air quality so severely that they caused conditions such as headaches, nausea, and fatigue, among others, in workers.
Lack of Exercise
The unanimous consensus of the medical workers in medical scrubs is that a 40-hour-a-week stint at an office desk is a primary contributor to weight gain. As the American job market has shifted from manufacturing work to desk jobs, the problem has only gotten worse. A 2010 study in The Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine found that the obese were less productive in the workplace than their counterparts of average weight. Taken together, the study estimated that obesity among full-time employees in the U.S. cost employers more than $73 billion per year.
Insufficient Sleep
Doctors wearing medical scrubs recommend getting eight hours of sleep per night, but one look around the average office reveals that, for many, it just isn’t happening. The bags under everyone’s eyes and the drained coffee cups tell the tale, along with a recent survey of more than 7,000 people, 23 percent of whom reported experiencing insomnia. What’s causing the sleeplessness? One of the primary causes of insomnia is stress, particularly stress encountered in the workplace, according to the Mayo Clinic. The sleep-deprived often don’t view their fatigue as a reason to call in sick, however, so they go to work and turn in lethargic, sluggish performances that cost employers $63 billion a year in lost productivity, according to a Harvard Medical School study.
Looking unto this list makes me wonder, if our jobs are still worth our priorities since it may kill us. Ironically we also need to work to live. Yet, is there any person who will not die? For me the balance between our priorities must be thought and be acted upon with wisdom. Since jobs will not last as well as may help hasten our death, why not focus our attention on people we know (even while working).Those people that we may help to change their ways and their lives, that even if we will die for the reason of our jobs, we will not die in vain.
Sources: Google Images | 10 Ways Your Job is Killing You
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