Correlates of Depression in the Slovenian Working Population

Abstract

This multicentre, cross-sectional observational study aimed to determine the prevalence of depression among the working population of Slovenia and identify factors correlating with higher prevalence of depression. It was conducted in three occupational medicine practices within major Slovenian primary health care centres. The study population consisted of 1,474 respondents [73.7 % of the invited participants, 889 (60.3 %) men and 585 (39.7 %) women with mean age of (40.5±9.8) years] who visited these practices for their regular check-ups from November 2010 to June 2012 and were asked to fi ll in a self-developed questionnaire and score depression on the Zung's self-rating depression scale. According to the rating, 50 (3.4 %) respondents suffered from depression. In the multivariate analysis, depression correlated with the following independent variables: self-perceived exposure to chronic stress, positive family history of depression, and primary school education.

Associations of occupational stress with job burn-out, depression and hypertension in coal miners of Xinjiang, China: a cross-sectional study

“… 33 Depression has a negative effect on both society and individuals; more importantly, it causes financial loss and reduces productivity. 35 This study demonstrated that of the coal miners had severe depression. In addition, the rate of depression in coal miners with occupational stress was higher than that of the occupational stress-free counterparts, corroborating a previous report.…”

The Onset of Depression in Middle-Aged Presumed Healthy Slovenian Family Practice Attendees and Its Associations with Genetic Risk Assessment, Quality of Life and Health Status: A Contribution for Family Medicine Practitioners’ Early Detection

“…In the subgroups within the age limits of this study (between 30 and 65 years old), they found a prevalence of 3.8%, 5.6%, and 4.8% for ages between 35 and 44, 45 and 54, 55 and 64 years, respectively [15]. However, compared to the other studies addressing depression prevalence in the Slovenian population, the number was unusually low, as they have generally found the prevalence to be in the proximity of 15% with 3.4% and 24.3% being the furthest outliers [2,[9][10][11][12][13][14]. Though a part of this discrepancy might be explained by a lower age of participants in this study (42.8 yrs.…”

“…Studies looking at the Slovenian population have been similarly variable, estimating the prevalence between 3.4% and almost 25% in different groups [2,[9][10][11][12][13][14], while the National Institute of Public Health estimates the overall prevalence in Slovenia to be 5.5% [15].…”

“…Studies looking at the population in general have estimated a prevalence of either 3.4% [9] or 9.1% [10]. Among family practice patients, depression is estimated to occur in around 10% worldwide [11], but there has been significant variability in prevalence between studies looking at Slovenian adult family practice attendees.…”

“…Many factors have been strongly and repeatedly associated with depression: female gender [18][19][20]; older age [19,21]; lower education [12,19,22]; lower socioeconomic status [19,23,24] and unemployment [24]; perceived social isolation [25,26]; alcohol consumption, drug abuse [27]; different stress-inducing situations [9,27]; and disruption to intimate relationships, such as divorce, spousal substance dependency, and intimate partner violence [12,14,28,29]. Between a third and a half of depression variance can be attributed to heritable factors [30], thus a positive family history is considered one of the three most powerful predictors of depression, together with recent major life events, and a personal history of past depressive episodes [31].…”