Age dynamics of working capacity and fatigue risk of employees of industrial enterprises, education, and healthcare

Abstract

Introduction. It is necessary to consider the employee's age and health status to increase the reliability and accuracy of predicting occupational risk based on working conditions. Moreover, knowledge about the age dynamics of a person's working capacity is also required to preserve its longevity in pre-retirement and retirement age. The length of the working week (LWW) and work intensity (WI) often become the primary risk of chronic fatigue and related diseases. The latter is common among employees of industrial enterprises, doctors, teachers. The study aims to research the age dynamics of working capacity and the risk of industrial fatigue of employees of industrial enterprises, education and healthcare. Materials and methods. We examined six groups of employees. The central employees of large factories: workers engaged in regional physical labor (GR 1.1, 1175 people) and precision work (GR 1.2, 708 people), specialists, and managers (GR 1.3, 307 people). Medical workers (GR 2, 1041 people). University teachers (GR 3.1, 694 people). School teachers (GR 3.2, 130 people). Researchers studied groups by different methods, depending on the degree of diversity of the content of labor actions during the working day and their variation by days of the working week. We used the survey method to determine the degree, frequency, and duration of employee fatigue. Results. All factory workers in the age range of 18-49 years have a monotonous increase in the risk of severe fatigue at work (SFW) due to the rise in fatigue disappearance and increasing the intensity of work (IW). With an increase in the age of employees, GR 1.2 IW and working week duration (WWD) do not decrease, but all indicators of the physiological cost of maintaining the level of labor productivity increase. In workers of GR 2 and GR 3.1, the value of SWF in the age group of 30-40 years is from 6 to 14%, which is two times lower than in GR 1.1 and GR 1.2. In group GR 3.1, there is a lowering of the value of WI. We tend to reduce SFW up to 70-75 years of age; 20-35% of teachers have WWD more than 50 hours. The greatest WWD we observe at the age of 50-60 years. Also, we follow the lowering of WWD in healthcare workers, while it monotonically decreases with age. Teachers have increased WI, and there is no age-related tendency to decrease the value of SWF in them. The most significant number of university employees falls in the age group of 60-64 years and GR 1.2 - on the age of 30-34 years. Conclusions. The age dynamics of working capacity we consider as a process of biological aging of the body, the speed of which depends on the psychophysiological requirements of labor standards and the degree of their fatigue.With a tiring level of labor intensity, when the performance of labor standards requires the employee to speed and volume of sensorimotor tasks, performance decreases significantly with age. With regional physical labor without increased requirements for the accuracy of visual-motor reactions, performance decreases at the age of 51-55 years to 0.9; at 56-60 years - to 0.8; in 61-65 years - up to 0.75. With high sensorimotor requirements, performance decreases earlier and more significantly - at the age of 46-50 years to 0.7, at 51-55 years to 0.5, at the age of more than 55 years, the ability to fulfill labor standards decreases two times. With tireless work, when its result depends not on its physiological intensity (density and pace of labor actions), but on the knowledge and experience of the employee, the ability of a person to fulfill labor standards remains up to 75 years, and there is no age decrement of working capacity. Therefore, the indicator "long working hours per week" (extended hours) is a risk factor for employees' health only when combined with the physiological intensity of work that causes their fatigue on working days.