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This paper reports on the psychometric properties of the World Health Organization Abbreviated Instrument for Quality of Life Assessment (WHOQOL-Bref), comprising 26 items which measure the following broad domains: physical health, psychological health, social relationships, and environment. The instrument was used in the Pró-Saúde Study, a cohort study of public employees at university campuses in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, during the pilot phase, and by 3,574 subjects in study phase 2 (2001). The estimated test-retest reliability of the responses, measured by intraclass correlation coefficients, ranged from 0.76 to 0.91 across domains. The internal consistency of the items, measured by Cronbach's alpha coefficients, was estimated between 0.69 and 0.79. The factor structure, using iterated principal factor methodology and varimax rotation, did not exactly replicate the structure of the original instrument as assessed during its field tests; among other reasons, the observed discrepancies may be due to the study population's characteristics (active working-age and relatively healthy).

A growing burden of mental illness, and in particular depression, among workers is a concern of occupational public health. Scientific evidence has revealed consistent associations of work-related stress, as measured by theoretical models, with depression, but mostly so in developed countries. This contribution explores these associations in a developing Latin American country, Brazil, by applying an internationally established work stress model, the effort-reward imbalance (ERI). This model focuses on the work contract where unjust exchange between high efforts spent and low rewards received in turn contributes to stress-related disorders. The model’s extrinsic (‘effort’, ‘reward’) and intrinsic components (‘over-commitment’), as well as their combination, are hypothesized to be related to a higher risk of depressive episodes (DE). Using cross-sectional data from the ELSA-Brasil study, including 10,034 workers from the public sector, we observed increased prevalence ratio (PR) of DE according to ERI scales. The quartiles of highest ‘effort’ (PR = 1.85; 1.44–2.37), highest ‘over-commitment’ (PR = 3.62; 2.80–4.70) and lowest ‘reward’ (PR = 3.44; 2.55–4.64) were associated with DE, on adjusted models, as well was the E–R ratio (PR = 2.47; 1.92–3.17). An additive interaction was identified between the E–R ratio and ‘over-commitment’. The results support the use of ERI as a screening tool for work stress in the Brazilian context and will offer guidance for worksite health promotion programs.