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Comparison Between Musculoskeletal Pain and Gender-Specific, Non-gendered Job-Exposure Matrix and Self-reported Exposures in CONSTANCES

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Abstract

Purpose

Musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) are common worldwide and gender differences exist in terms of prevalence and disability. MSDs are a leading cause of sick leave and physical work exposures. To assess the association between physical exposures assessed by the gender-specific CONSTANCES Job-Exposure Matrix (JEM) and musculoskeletal pain in six areas: neck pain, shoulder pain, elbow/arm pain, hand/wrist pain, low back pain, knee/leg pain; and to compare the results with those obtained using the non-gendered CONSTANCES JEM and with individual self-report exposures.

Methods

We included 48,736 male and 63,326 female workers from the CONSTANCES cohort (France). The association between 27 physical exposures and musculoskeletal self-reported pain in six body areas was assessed using logistic regression. We conducted the analysis with three types of exposures: (1) individual self-reported exposures; (2) gender-specific CONSTANCES JEM; (3) non-gendered CONSTANCES JEM, and adjusted for age and Body Mass Index (BMI). Analyses were stratified by gender.

Results

The associations to the gender-specific and non-gendered JEM were similar. The odds ratios using individual self-reported exposures were comparable to the JEM-based associations, with the exceptions of the exposures ‘change tasks’, ‘rest eyes’ and ‘reach behind’. In some comparisons, there were differences in the direction and/or significance of effects between genders (regardless of whether the JEM used was gender-specific or not).

Conclusion

The gender-specific and non-gendered JEMs gave similar results, hence, developing physical work exposures JEMs that are gender-specific may not be essential. However, when predicting musculoskeletal pain, it seems relevant to stratify the analysis by gender.

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Funding

This project was part of the “TEC-TOP project” which was funded by a regional public fund of the Pays-de-la-Loire Region, Angers Loire Metropole, University of Angers and CHU Angers.

The CONSTANCES Cohort Study is an “Infrastructure nationale en Biologie et Santé” and benefits from a grant from the French National Agency for Research (ANR-11-INBS-0002). CONSTANCES is also partly funded by Merck Sharp & Dohme (MSD), AstraZeneca, Lundbeck and L’Oréal through Inserm-Transfert. None of these funding sources had any role in the design of the study, collection and analysis of data or decision to publish.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. UMR_S 1085, IRSET-ESTER, SFR ICAT, CAPTV CDC, Univ Angers, CHU Angers, Univ Rennes, Inserm, EHESP, Irset (Institut de recherche en santé, environnement et travail), Angers, France

    Francesca Wuytack, Fabien Gilbert, Marc Fadel & Alexis Descatha

  2. Division of General Medical Sciences, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, USA

    Bradley A. Evanoff & Ann Marie Dale

  3. Unité “Cohortes en Population” UMS 011 Inserm, Université de Paris, Villejuif, France

    Annette Leclerc

  4. Department of Occupational Medicine, Epidemiology and Prevention, Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine, Hofstra/Northwell, Hempstead, USA

    Alexis Descatha

Authors
  1. Francesca Wuytack
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  2. Bradley A. Evanoff
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  3. Ann Marie Dale
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  4. Fabien Gilbert
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  5. Marc Fadel
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  6. Annette Leclerc
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  7. Alexis Descatha
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Contributions

All authors were involved in the design of the study. FW and FG conducted the data analysis, and FW drafted the manuscript. All authors meet the requirements of authorship, the manuscript has been reviewed by all authors before submission.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Alexis Descatha.

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Competing interests

The authors report no conflicts of interest; authors are paid by their institutions and AD is also paid as editor of the Archives des Maladies professionnelles et de l’Environnement (Elsevier). AD is also member of the JoOR board.

Ethical Approval

The procedures followed were in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration as revised in 2008. Ethical approval was granted for CONSTANCES by the Comité d’Evaluation Ethique de l’Inserm (IRB0000388, FWA00005831), and by the CCTIRS and CNIL (15–636 and 2017 —172 ,respectively) as part of the overarching Comett—Musculoskeletal Observatory Cohort study.

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Wuytack, F., Evanoff, B.A., Dale, A.M. et al. Comparison Between Musculoskeletal Pain and Gender-Specific, Non-gendered Job-Exposure Matrix and Self-reported Exposures in CONSTANCES. J Occup Rehabil (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10926-023-10148-w

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10926-023-10148-w

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