If you work a lot, you often drink too much alcohol

People with high workload drink more often in risky quantities

01/15/2015

If you work a lot, you often drink a lot of alcohol. An international meta-analysis has now come to this conclusion, for which a total of more than 80 studies were evaluated. Accordingly, the preference for alcoholic beverages, the higher the more hours worked per week. Thus, especially people who work a lot would drink more often harmful to health.

Alcohol helps many workers to switch off from everyday office work
The red wine to eat after a long day's work or a relaxing after-work beer with colleagues in the corner bar: For many people, alcohol is part of the normal everyday life of course, and offers a welcome support „Switch off“ and „Come down“ after work. This has now been confirmed by a recent meta-analysis, for which 44 international researchers have analyzed a total of 81 studies in relation to the relationship between alcohol consumption and working hours. However, the tendency to drink alcoholic beverages such as wine, beer or spirits also increases with the number of weekly working hours - which often means a harmful consumption, especially for frequent workers.

International researchers evaluate more than 80 studies
As scientists from different countries report in the British Medical Journal, they used two different datasets for their comprehensive project. On the one hand, they examined 61 studies involving a total of 333,693 participants from 14 countries, with questions on working hours and alcohol consumption „Status quo“ had been raised. In addition, the researchers analyzed the data from 20 „prospective“ (prospective) studies in which, in nine countries, a total of 100,602 subjects had participated in the study „normal“ People had consumed. In the course of these studies, it was then examined whether and to what extent the drinking behavior changed with regard to the working hours and whether many workers drink more than others.

From 49 hours per week is often drunk in risky quantities
The result: Those who work more than 49 hours a week would be more likely to consume alcohol in amounts that could be detrimental to their physical and mental health. The scientists had set more than 21 drinks for men and more than 14 weekly drinks for women - one drink each meant a small beer, 125ml of wine or a small schnapps. According to the researchers, the different investigations always produced similar results - even if the study structure was completely different. Thus, among those who work more than the usual 35-40 hours, there has always been a higher proportion of people with high-risk alcohol consumption or more subjects have developed in that direction,
according to Marianna Virtanen of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health in the British Medical Journal.

Study confirms longer-existing suspicion
With these results, the meta-analysis of the international research team has confirmed the suspicion that has existed for some time, „that among workers with long working hours, alcohol may appear as a quick-acting and effective way of alleviating work-related complaints and annoyances, and of a more balanced transition between work and leisure“, Cassandra Okechukwu of the Harvard School of Public Health commented on the study in the British Medical Journal. At the same time, the high consumption among the much-employed workers had long since proved to be not just a managerial problem for the scientists. Instead, the context was clear regardless of gender, age, origin and social environment of the subjects.

Results transferable to over two million workers
In the prospective studies, an average of 6.3 percent of the participants had a risky relationship to alcohol, with the proportion among the high-skilled being 0.8 percent higher overall than among those with „normal“ Working hours. A difference that, according to Okechukwu, may seem negligible at first glance. „However, this increase represents over 600 employees, from the prospective studies alone. If the relationship is causal, this can be translated to more than two million people in the working population who develop high-risk alcohol consumption in the 14 countries the study represents“, the scientist continues. „This well-designed meta-analysis by Virtanen and her colleagues supports other evidence that long hours are an important factor in worker health“, writes Okechukwu. Accordingly, be now „Further research needed to assess whether preventive measures against risky drinking could benefit from information on working hours“, so the scientists in their conclusion. (No)