[Association between social psychological factors and depressive symptoms among healthcare workers]

To explore the association between the effort-reward imbalance at work and depressive symptoms among healthcare workers.

The effort-reward imbalance at work was conceptualized in terms of the Chinese version of the effort-reward imbalance (ERI) model. Depressive symptoms were assessed by the Chinese version of the Center of Epidemiology Survey Depression (CES-D) scale. The data came from the cross-sectional survey of 1 179 healthcare workers aged between 18 and 73 employed in 6 affiliated hospitals of Zhejiang University. The questionnaire comprised questions on the effort-reward at work, over-commitment, the full CES-D scale of depression and a range of other characteristics. Univariate analyses were used with Spearman's correlation, Mann-Whitney test, Pearson chi(2) test and likelihood chi(2) test. Multivariate logistic regression analyses was used to discover factors associated with depressive symptoms.

The prevalence of depressive symptoms among healthcare workers was 48.12% (95% CI: 45.08% to 51.16%). The prevalence of depressive symptoms among nurses was 52.40% (95% CI: 47.87% to 56.93%) higher than doctors' 44.70% (95% CI: 10.64% to 48.77%) with the significant difference (chi(2) = 6.077, P = 0.014). Positive associations were found between the high effort-low reward, level of work-related over commitment and depressive symptoms (OR = 1.859, 95% CI: 1.337 to 2.585; OR = 2.207, 95% CI: 1.656 to 2.942) among healthcare workers, respectively.

The high effort-low reward and the work-related over-commitment have a negative impact on healthcare workers' health.