Occupational risks in hospitals, quality of life, and quality of work life: A systematic review

Abstract

This study systematically reviewed the relationship between occupational risks and quality of life (QoL) and quality of work life (QWL) in hospitals. A systematic review was performed according to the recommendations of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guide, and the protocol was submitted on the PROSPERO website (CRD 2019127865). The last search was performed in June 2021 by two independent reviewers in the main databases, a gray literature database, and a manual search (LILACS, MEDLINE/PubMed, PsycINFO, CINAHL, Scopus, Embase, Brazilian Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations, Ovid). As eligibility criteria, we included observational studies, with adult hospital workers, with no restrictions on date and language, any type of instrument to assess QoL and QWL, any definition of QoL and QWL, and studies that presented the relationship between exposure and outcome. Newcastle–Ottawa was used to assess the methodological quality and RTI-Item Bank to assess the risk of bias. Given the impossibility of performing a meta-analysis, a qualitative synthesis was used to present the results. Thus, 11 studies met the criteria and were included in the review, with 6923 individuals aged 18 to 64 years. The studies were mainly carried out with health professionals (81.81%), women (63.60%), and in Asian countries (63.63%). All studies used different instruments and ways to categorize the QoL and QWL, and occupational risks. Only one study assessed occupational noise and another the ergonomic risk. All of them presented a relationship between occupational risk and quality of work life. They pointed to the need for measures to improve the lives of these professionals in the work environment. Therefore, studies show a relationship between occupational risks (noise, ergonomics, and stress) and workers’ perception of low or moderate quality of work life. However, more homogeneous studies are necessary for instruments, conceptualization, and categorization of quality of work life.