Evaluating trends in new cases of Work-Related Mental Ill-health after introduction of The Health and Safety Executives’ Management Standards

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Abstract
Background: Work-related stress (WRS) accounts for 52% of self-reported work-related ill-health. In 2004, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) developed the Management Standards (MS), aimed at helping organisations reduce WRS. This work investigates WRS post implementation, with reference to six MS risk factor domains: control, support, relationships, demand, change, and role . Method: Cases of WRS were extracted from The Health and Occupation Research (THOR) database and mapped to the six domains. Trends in WRS incidence rates attributed to each of the domains were split at 2004 and compared with the overall WRS trend using mixed generalised regression models. Results: Before 2004, annual incidence in WRS increased by 1.4%(-0.5%,3.1%), whereas after 2004, there was a decrease of -0.9%(-1.5%,-0.2%), based on 10,815 WRS cases reported between 1996 and 2019. Three of the six MS domains ( demands, relationships, and change ) were reported in ∼82% of cases. Pre-2004, four of the six domains were observed to be increasing per year. Post 2004, cases increasingly contained multiple precipitating events e.g. demands + another (+2.6% per year ) and relationships + another (6 . 1%) . Reports of the two most common domains decreased post 2004 ( demands -0.46%, relationships -0.55% per year), whereas incidence in less common domains increased (change 1.1%, support 2.4%, control 4.8%, role 4.7%). Conclusion: Trends in WRS, and their common risk factors appear to be decreasing gradually, since introduction of MS in 2004. However, less common risk factors are becoming more prominent, contributing to reporting of WRS with multiple risk factors.

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