Our results suggest that MetS is a predictive factor for the development of depression, and that waist circumference largely contributes to the association between MetS and depression.

Recent studies suggest that unstable employment contracts may affect the health of workers. Many Japanese workers working full time in ostensibly permanent positions actually operate within unstable and precarious employment conditions. We compared the health status of Japanese workers with precarious employment contracts with that of permanent workers using the 2007 Comprehensive Survey of Living Conditions of the People on Health and Welfare (n=205,994). We classified their employment status as 'permanent' vs. 'precarious' (part-time, dispatch, or contract/ non-regular) and compared their health conditions. Among both sexes, precarious workers were more likely than permanent workers to have poor self-rated health or more subjective symptoms, with more workers in full-time employment suffering from serious psychological distress (SPD) and more female workers who smoke. Using logistic regression, we identified a positive association between precarious employment and SPD and current smoking among workers engaged in fulltime employment after adjusting for age, marital status, and work-related conditions. This study demonstrates that precarious employment contracts are associated with poor self-rated health, psychological distress, and tobacco use, especially among people working full-time jobs. These results suggest that engagement in full-time work under unstable employment status impairs workers' health.

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ObjectivesDespite being highly educated in comparison with women in other member countries of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, Japanese women are expected to assume traditional gender roles, and many dedicate themselves to full-time housewifery. Women working outside the home do so under poor conditions, and their health may not be better than that of housewives. This study compared the self-rated health status and health behaviours of housewives and working women in Japan.DesignCross-sectional survey.SettingA national university in Tokyo with 9864 alumnae.ParticipantsA total 1344 women who graduated since 1985 and completed questionnaires in an anonymous mail-based survey.Primary and secondary outcome measuresHealth anxiety and satisfaction, receipt of health check-ups, eating breakfast, smoking, and sleep problems according to job status and family demands: housewives (n=247) and working women with (n=624) and without (n=436) family demands. ORs were used for risk assessment, with housewives as a reference.ResultsAfter adjustment for satisfaction with present employment status and other confounding factors, working women were more likely than housewives to feel health anxiety (with family demands, OR: 1.68, 95% CI1.10 to 2.57; without family demands, OR: 3.57, 95% CI 2.19 to 4.50) and health dissatisfaction (without family demands, OR: 3.50, 95% CI 2.35 to 5.21); they were also more likely than housewives to eat an insufficient breakfast (with family demands, OR: 1.91, 95% CI 1.22 to 3.00; without family demands, OR: 4.02, 95% CI 2.47 to 6.57) and to have sleep problems (ORs: 2.08 to 4.03).ConclusionsNo healthy-worker effect was found among Japanese women. Housewives, at least those who are well educated, appear to have better health status and health-related behaviours than do working women with the same level of education.

In Japan, workers with precarious employment, most notably hourly and dispatched workers, had a lower rate of health check-ups compared with full-time workers in permanent positions.

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This study assesses the possibility of a period effect on Japanese workers' health and its association with historical changes in the work environment. We used multi-year national cross-sectional surveys, the Comprehensive Survey of Living Conditions for 2001, 2004, and 2007, and estimated the period effect on the health of employed workers aged 18-65 years. The prevalence of ill-health indicators (poor self-rated health status, subjective symptoms, and the number of respondents receiving consultations from medical doctors and other health professionals) significantly increased during this period. Deteriorating trends in these health indicators persisted after adjusting for age and cohort effects and for individual factors such as employment, marital, and child-rearing status. Furthermore, after adjusting for income level as an individual factor, deteriorating trends remained for the poor self-rated health status of male employees, subjective symptoms of female employees, and receiving medical consultations for both genders. The health status of employed workers in Japan deteriorated, especially from 2004 to 2007, regardless of age and cohort effects. After taking individual socio-economic factors and the effects of the recession on society into consideration, we hypothesized a posteriori that the increase in precarious non-regular work may be the main factor underlying this period effect and may be the cause of the deterioration in workers' health.