Giving Social Support at Work May Reduce Inflammation on Employees Themselves: A Participatory Workplace Intervention Study Among Japanese Hospital Nurses

Abstract

ObjectivePreviously, we reported that the participatory workplace intervention was effective in reducing stress-related inflammatory markers, i.e., interleukin-6, among 31 Japanese female nurses. During the analysis, we recognized that our intervention might have increased prosocial behaviors like giving social support to others in some participants. Based on this assumption, we ran a secondary analysis, which examined the effect of giving social support to others on inflammatory markers, autonomic nervous activity, and perceived job stress before and after a 5-month intervention. We divided participants into two groups; those who had increased scores on giving social support after the intervention (Group 1, n = 13), and those who had decreased/unchanged in the scores (Group 2, n = 17). Friedman test was used to examine the changes in outcome measures by the group. ResultsGroup 1 showed significant decreases in interferon-γ, interleukin-6, and interleukin-12/23p40 immediately after the intervention, while interleukin-12/23p40 remained stably decreased three months later; Group 2 did not show changes in these markers. No significant changes were observed regarding autonomic nervous activity and perceived job stress. This study presented a significant insight that giving social support at work may provide health benefits towards employees themselves, via decreasing inflammation in the body.