TY - JOUR
T1 - Working nights and lower leisure-time physical activity associate with chronic pain in Southern African long-distance truck drivers
T2 - A cross-sectional study
AU - Wadley, Antonia L
AU - Iacovides, Stella
AU - Roche, Johanna
AU - Scheuermaier, Karine
AU - Venter, W D Francois
AU - Vos, Alinda G
AU - Lalla-Edward, Samanta T
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was funded by North Star Alliance through a research and implementation grant received from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of The Netherlands managed by the Royal Dutch Embassy of Mozambique. The Amsterdam Institute for Global Health and Development and Wits RHI held separate contracts with North Star Alliance (AIGHD?s grant reference: 0068 North Star ? NSCDP; RHI?s grant number: D1404070). The views of this study are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of any of the funders or the South African and Dutch governments.The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. The authors would like to thank North Star Alliance for their assistance during participant recruitment and the truck drivers for their participation.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 Wadley et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Copyright:
Copyright 2021 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2020/12
Y1 - 2020/12
N2 - BACKGROUND: In South Africa, the trucking industry employs over 70,000 people and the prevalence of chronic pain in this occupational group was reported at 10%. We investigated factors associated with chronic pain in truck drivers including mental health, physical activity, and sleep, as no study has done so.METHODS: Southern African male, long-distance truck drivers were recruited at truck stops in Gauteng and Free State Provinces, South Africa (n = 614). Chronic pain was defined as pain present for at least the last three months. Depressive symptoms were assessed with the Patient Health Questionnaire-9, post-traumatic stress disorder with the Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Checklist for DSM-5 (PCL-5), exposure to traumatic events with the Life Events Checklist-5 (LEC-5) and daytime sleepiness with the Epworth Sleepiness Scale. Sleep quality was measured on a four-point Likert scale. Leisure-time physical activity was measured using the Godin-Shephard leisure-time physical activity questionnaire. Associations between these factors, demographic factors and chronic pain were investigated.RESULTS: Multivariate analysis showed that working ≥ 2 nights/week (OR = 2.68, 95% CI = 1.55-4.68) was associated with chronic pain and physical activity was protective (OR = 0.97, 95% CI 0.95-0.98). In an exploratory analysis, greater depressive symptoms (p = 0.004), daytime sleepiness (p = 0.01) and worse sleep quality (p = 0.001) was associated with working ≥ 2 nights/week. Lower leisure-time physical activity was associated with worse sleep quality (p = 0.006), but not daytime sleepiness or depressive symptoms (p>0.05).CONCLUSIONS: There is a clear relationship between working nights and activity levels, and chronic pain, sleep quality, and depression in truck drivers.
AB - BACKGROUND: In South Africa, the trucking industry employs over 70,000 people and the prevalence of chronic pain in this occupational group was reported at 10%. We investigated factors associated with chronic pain in truck drivers including mental health, physical activity, and sleep, as no study has done so.METHODS: Southern African male, long-distance truck drivers were recruited at truck stops in Gauteng and Free State Provinces, South Africa (n = 614). Chronic pain was defined as pain present for at least the last three months. Depressive symptoms were assessed with the Patient Health Questionnaire-9, post-traumatic stress disorder with the Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Checklist for DSM-5 (PCL-5), exposure to traumatic events with the Life Events Checklist-5 (LEC-5) and daytime sleepiness with the Epworth Sleepiness Scale. Sleep quality was measured on a four-point Likert scale. Leisure-time physical activity was measured using the Godin-Shephard leisure-time physical activity questionnaire. Associations between these factors, demographic factors and chronic pain were investigated.RESULTS: Multivariate analysis showed that working ≥ 2 nights/week (OR = 2.68, 95% CI = 1.55-4.68) was associated with chronic pain and physical activity was protective (OR = 0.97, 95% CI 0.95-0.98). In an exploratory analysis, greater depressive symptoms (p = 0.004), daytime sleepiness (p = 0.01) and worse sleep quality (p = 0.001) was associated with working ≥ 2 nights/week. Lower leisure-time physical activity was associated with worse sleep quality (p = 0.006), but not daytime sleepiness or depressive symptoms (p>0.05).CONCLUSIONS: There is a clear relationship between working nights and activity levels, and chronic pain, sleep quality, and depression in truck drivers.
UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/85097123036
U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0243366
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0243366
M3 - Article
C2 - 33270793
SN - 1932-6203
VL - 15
JO - PLoS ONE
JF - PLoS ONE
IS - 12
M1 - e0243366
ER -