Association of alcohol use with years lived without major chronic diseases: A multicohort study from the IPD-Work consortium and UK Biobank.

Background: Heavy alcohol consumption increases the risk of several chronic diseases. In this multicohort study, we estimated the number of life-years without major chronic diseases according to different characteristics of alcohol use. Methods: In primary analysis, we pooled individual-level data from up to 129,942 adults across 12 cohort studies with baseline data collection on alcohol consumption, drinking patterns, and history between 1986 and 2005 (the IPD-Work Consortium). Self-reported alcohol consumption was categorised according to UK guidelines - non-drinking (never or former drinkers); moderate consumption (1-14 units); heavy consumption (>14 units per week). We further subdivided moderate and heavy drinkers by binge drinking pattern (alcohol-induced loss of consciousness). In addition, we assessed problem drinking using linked data on hospitalisations due to alcohol abuse or poisoning. Follow-up for chronic diseases for all participants included incident type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, stroke, cancer, and respiratory disease (asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) as ascertained via linkage to national morbidity and mortality registries, repeated medical examinations, and/or self-report. We estimated years lived without any of these diseases between 40 and 75 years of age according to sex and characteristics of alcohol use. We repeated the main analyses using data from 427,621 participants in the UK Biobank cohort study. Findings: During 1·73 million person-years at risk, 22,676 participants in IPD-Work cohorts developed at least one chronic condition. From age 40 to 75 years, never-drinkers [men: 29·3 (95%CI 27·9-30·8) years, women 29·8 (29·2-30·4) years)] and moderate drinkers with no binge drinking habit [men 28·7 (28·4-29·0) years, women 29·6 (29·4-29·7) years] had the longest disease-free life span. A much shorter disease-free life span was apparent in participants who experienced alcohol poisoning [men 23·4 (20·9-26·0) years, women 24·0 (21·4-26·5) years] and those with self-reported heavy overall consumption and binge drinking [men: 26·0 (25·3-26·8), women 27·5 (26·4-28·5) years]. The pattern of results for alcohol poisoning and self-reported alcohol consumption was similar in UK Biobank. In IPD-Work and UK Biobank, differences in disease-free years between self-reported moderate drinkers and heavy drinkers were 1·5 years or less. Interpretation: Individuals with alcohol poisonings or heavy self-reported overall consumption combined with a binge drinking habit have a marked 3- to 6-year loss in healthy longevity. Differences in disease-free life between categories of self-reported weekly alcohol consumption were smaller. Funding: Medical Research Council, National Institute on Aging, NordForsk, Academy of Finland, Finnish Work Environment Fund.

Work stress and loss of years lived without chronic disease: an 18-year follow-up of 1.5 million employees in Denmark.

We aimed to examine the association between exposure to work stress and chronic disease incidence and loss of chronic disease-free life years in the Danish workforce. The study population included 1,592,491 employees, aged 30-59 in 2000 and without prevalent chronic diseases. We assessed work stress as the combination of job strain and effort-reward imbalance using job exposure matrices. We used Cox regressions to estimate risk of incident hospital-diagnoses or death of chronic diseases (i.e., type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, stroke, cancer, asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, heart failure, and dementia) during 18 years of follow-up and calculated corresponding chronic disease-free life expectancy from age 30 to age 75. Individuals working in occupations with high prevalence of work stress had a higher risk of incident chronic disease compared to those in occupations with low prevalence of work stress (women: HR 1.04 (95% CI 1.02-1.05), men: HR 1.12 (95% CI 1.11-1.14)). The corresponding loss in chronic disease-free life expectancy was 0.25 (95% CI - 0.10 to 0.60) and 0.84 (95% CI 0.56-1.11) years in women and men, respectively. Additional adjustment for health behaviours attenuated these associations among men. We conclude that men working in high-stress occupations have a small loss of years lived without chronic disease compared to men working in low-stress occupations. This finding appeared to be partially attributable to harmful health behaviours. In women, high work stress indicated a very small and statistically non-significant loss of years lived without chronic disease.

Association of Healthy Lifestyle With Years Lived Without Major Chronic Diseases.

Importance: It is well established that selected lifestyle factors are individually associated with lower risk of chronic diseases, but how combinations of these factors are associated with disease-free life-years is unknown. Objective: To estimate the association between healthy lifestyle and the number of disease-free life-years. Design, Setting, and Participants: A prospective multicohort study, including 12 European studies as part of the Individual-Participant-Data Meta-analysis in Working Populations Consortium, was performed. Participants included 116 043 people free of major noncommunicable disease at baseline from August 7, 1991, to May 31, 2006. Data analysis was conducted from May 22, 2018, to January 21, 2020. Exposures: Four baseline lifestyle factors (smoking, body mass index, physical activity, and alcohol consumption) were each allocated a score based on risk status: optimal (2 points), intermediate (1 point), or poor (0 points) resulting in an aggregated lifestyle score ranging from 0 (worst) to 8 (best). Sixteen lifestyle profiles were constructed from combinations of these risk factors. Main Outcomes and Measures: The number of years between ages 40 and 75 years without chronic disease, including type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, stroke, cancer, asthma, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Results: Of the 116 043 people included in the analysis, the mean (SD) age was 43.7 (10.1) years and 70 911 were women (61.1%). During 1.45 million person-years at risk (mean follow-up, 12.5 years; range, 4.9-18.6 years), 17 383 participants developed at least 1 chronic disease. There was a linear association between overall healthy lifestyle score and the number of disease-free years, such that a 1-point improvement in the score was associated with an increase of 0.96 (95% CI, 0.83-1.08) disease-free years in men and 0.89 (95% CI, 0.75-1.02) years in women. Comparing the best lifestyle score with the worst lifestyle score was associated with 9.9 (95% CI 6.7-13.1) additional years without chronic diseases in men and 9.4 (95% CI 5.4-13.3) additional years in women (P < .001 for dose-response). All of the 4 lifestyle profiles that were associated with the highest number of disease-free years included a body-mass index less than 25 (calculated as weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared) and at least 2 of the following factors: never smoking, physical activity, and moderate alcohol consumption. Participants with 1 of these lifestyle profiles reached age 70.3 (95% CI, 69.9-70.8) to 71.4 (95% CI, 70.9-72.0) years disease free depending on the profile and sex. Conclusions and Relevance: In this multicohort analysis, various healthy lifestyle profiles appeared to be associated with gains in life-years without major chronic diseases.

Job Strain as a Risk Factor for Peripheral Artery Disease: A Multi-Cohort Study.

Background Job strain is implicated in many atherosclerotic diseases, but its role in peripheral artery disease (PAD) is unclear. We investigated the association of job strain with hospital records of PAD, using individual-level data from 11 prospective cohort studies from Finland, Sweden, Denmark, and the United Kingdom. Methods and Results Job strain (high demands and low control at work) was self-reported at baseline (1985-2008). PAD records were ascertained from national hospitalization data. We used Cox regression to examine the associations of job strain with PAD in each study, and combined the study-specific estimates in random effects meta-analyses. We used τ2, I2, and subgroup analyses to examine heterogeneity. Of the 139 132 participants with no previous hospitalization with PAD, 32 489 (23.4%) reported job strain at baseline. During 1 718 132 person-years at risk (mean follow-up 12.8 years), 667 individuals had a hospital record of PAD (3.88 per 10 000 person-years). Job strain was associated with a 1.41-fold (95% CI, 1.11-1.80) increased average risk of hospitalization with PAD. The study-specific estimates were moderately heterogeneous (τ2=0.0427, I2: 26.9%). Despite variation in their magnitude, the estimates were consistent in both sexes, across the socioeconomic hierarchy and by baseline smoking status. Additional adjustment for baseline diabetes mellitus did not change the direction or magnitude of the observed associations. Conclusions Job strain was associated with small but consistent increase in the risk of hospitalization with PAD, with the relative risks on par with those for coronary heart disease and ischemic stroke.

Obesity and loss of disease-free years owing to major non-communicable diseases: a multicohort study.

BACKGROUND: Obesity increases the risk of several chronic diseases, but the extent to which the obesity-related loss of disease-free years varies by lifestyle category and across socioeconomic groups is unclear. We estimated the number of years free from major non-communicable diseases in adults who are overweight and obese, compared with those who are normal weight. METHODS: We pooled individual-level data on body-mass index (BMI) and non-communicable diseases from men and women with no initial evidence of these diseases in European cohort studies from the Individual-Participant-Data Meta-Analysis in Working Populations consortium. BMI was assessed at baseline (1991-2008) and non-communicable diseases (incident type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, stroke, cancer, asthma, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) were ascertained via linkage to records from national health registries, repeated medical examinations, or self-report. Disease-free years from age 40 years to 75 years associated with underweight (BMI <18·5 kg/m2), overweight (≥25 kg/m2 to <30 kg/m2), and obesity (class I [mild] ≥30 kg/m2 to <35 kg/m2; class II-III [severe] ≥35 kg/m2) compared with normal weight (≥18·5 kg/m2 to <25 kg/m2) were estimated. FINDINGS: Of 137 503 participants from ten studies, we excluded 6973 owing to missing data and 10 349 with prevalent disease at baseline, resulting in an analytic sample of 120 181 participants. Of 47 127 men, 211 (0·4%) were underweight, 21 468 (45·6%) normal weight, 20 738 (44·0%) overweight, 3982 (8·4%) class I obese, and 728 (1·5%) class II-III obese. The corresponding numbers among the 73 054 women were 1493 (2·0%), 44 760 (61·3%), 19 553 (26·8%), 5670 (7·8%), and 1578 (2·2%), respectively. During 1 328 873 person-years at risk (mean follow-up 11·5 years [range 6·3-18·6]), 8159 men and 8100 women developed at least one non-communicable disease. Between 40 years and 75 years, the estimated number of disease-free years was 29·3 (95% CI 28·8-29·8) in normal-weight men and 29·4 (28·7-30·0) in normal-weight women. Compared with normal weight, the loss of disease-free years in men was 1·8 (95% CI -1·3 to 4·9) for underweight, 1·1 (0·7 to 1·5) for overweight, 3·9 (2·9 to 4·9) for class I obese, and 8·5 (7·1 to 9·8) for class II-III obese. The corresponding estimates for women were 0·0 (-1·4 to 1·4) for underweight, 1·1 (0·6 to 1·5) for overweight, 2·7 (1·5 to 3·9) for class I obese, and 7·3 (6·1 to 8·6) for class II-III obese. The loss of disease-free years associated with class II-III obesity varied between 7·1 and 10·0 years in subgroups of participants of different socioeconomic level, physical activity level, and smoking habit. INTERPRETATION: Mild obesity was associated with the loss of one in ten, and severe obesity the loss of one in four potential disease-free years during middle and later adulthood. This increasing loss of disease-free years as obesity becomes more severe occurred in both sexes, among smokers and non-smokers, the physically active and inactive, and across the socioeconomic hierarchy. FUNDING: NordForsk, UK Medical Research Council, US National Institute on Aging, Academy of Finland, Helsinki Institute of Life Science, and Cancer Research UK.

Job insecurity and risk of diabetes: a meta-analysis of individual participant data.

BACKGROUND: Job insecurity has been associated with certain health outcomes. We examined the role of job insecurity as a risk factor for incident diabetes. METHODS: We used individual participant data from 8 cohort studies identified in 2 open-access data archives and 11 cohort studies participating in the Individual-Participant-Data Meta-analysis in Working Populations Consortium. We calculated study-specific estimates of the association between job insecurity reported at baseline and incident diabetes over the follow-up period. We pooled the estimates in a meta-analysis to produce a summary risk estimate. RESULTS: The 19 studies involved 140 825 participants from Australia, Europe and the United States, with a mean follow-up of 9.4 years and 3954 incident cases of diabetes. In the preliminary analysis adjusted for age and sex, high job insecurity was associated with an increased risk of incident diabetes compared with low job insecurity (adjusted odds ratio [OR] 1.19, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.09-1.30). In the multivariable-adjusted analysis restricted to 15 studies with baseline data for all covariates (age, sex, socioeconomic status, obesity, physical activity, alcohol and smoking), the association was slightly attenuated (adjusted OR 1.12, 95% CI 1.01-1.24). Heterogeneity between the studies was low to moderate (age- and sex-adjusted model: I2 = 24%, p = 0.2; multivariable-adjusted model: I2 = 27%, p = 0.2). In the multivariable-adjusted analysis restricted to high-quality studies, in which the diabetes diagnosis was ascertained from electronic medical records or clinical examination, the association was similar to that in the main analysis (adjusted OR 1.19, 95% CI 1.04-1.35). INTERPRETATION: Our findings suggest that self-reported job insecurity is associated with a modest increased risk of incident diabetes. Health care personnel should be aware of this association among workers reporting job insecurity.

Long working hours and cancer risk: a multi-cohort study.

BACKGROUND: Working longer than the maximum recommended hours is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, but the relationship of excess working hours with incident cancer is unclear. METHODS: This multi-cohort study examined the association between working hours and cancer risk in 116 462 men and women who were free of cancer at baseline. Incident cancers were ascertained from national cancer, hospitalisation and death registers; weekly working hours were self-reported. RESULTS: During median follow-up of 10.8 years, 4371 participants developed cancer (n colorectal cancer: 393; n lung cancer: 247; n breast cancer: 833; and n prostate cancer: 534). We found no clear evidence for an association between working hours and the overall cancer risk. Working hours were also unrelated the risk of incident colorectal, lung or prostate cancers. Working ⩾55 h per week was associated with 1.60-fold (95% confidence interval 1.12-2.29) increase in female breast cancer risk independently of age, socioeconomic position, shift- and night-time work and lifestyle factors, but this observation may have been influenced by residual confounding from parity. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest that working long hours is unrelated to the overall cancer risk or the risk of lung, colorectal or prostate cancers. The observed association with breast cancer would warrant further research.

Work stress and risk of cancer: meta-analysis of 5700 incident cancer events in 116,000 European men and women.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate whether work related stress, measured and defined as job strain, is associated with the overall risk of cancer and the risk of colorectal, lung, breast, or prostate cancers. DESIGN: Meta-analysis of pooled prospective individual participant data from 12 European cohort studies including 116,056 men and women aged 17-70 who were free from cancer at study baseline and were followed-up for a median of 12 years. Work stress was measured and defined as job strain, which was self reported at baseline. Incident cancers (all n=5765, colorectal cancer n=522, lung cancer n=374, breast cancer n=1010, prostate cancer n=865) were ascertained from cancer, hospital admission, and death registers. Data were analysed in each study with Cox regression and the study specific estimates pooled in meta-analyses. Models were adjusted for age, sex, socioeconomic position, body mass index (BMI), smoking, and alcohol intake RESULTS: A harmonised measure of work stress, high job strain, was not associated with overall risk of cancer (hazard ratio 0.97, 95% confidence interval 0.90 to 1.04) in the multivariable adjusted analyses. Similarly, no association was observed between job strain and the risk of colorectal (1.16, 0.90 to 1.48), lung (1.17, 0.88 to 1.54), breast (0.97, 0.82 to 1.14), or prostate (0.86, 0.68 to 1.09) cancers. There was no clear evidence for an association between the categories of job strain and the risk of cancer. CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest that work related stress, measured and defined as job strain, at baseline is unlikely to be an important risk factor for colorectal, lung, breast, or prostate cancers.

Job strain as a risk factor for coronary heart disease: a collaborative meta-analysis of individual participant data.

BACKGROUND: Published work assessing psychosocial stress (job strain) as a risk factor for coronary heart disease is inconsistent and subject to publication bias and reverse causation bias. We analysed the relation between job strain and coronary heart disease with a meta-analysis of published and unpublished studies. METHODS: We used individual records from 13 European cohort studies (1985-2006) of men and women without coronary heart disease who were employed at time of baseline assessment. We measured job strain with questions from validated job-content and demand-control questionnaires. We extracted data in two stages such that acquisition and harmonisation of job strain measure and covariables occurred before linkage to records for coronary heart disease. We defined incident coronary heart disease as the first non-fatal myocardial infarction or coronary death. FINDINGS: 30,214 (15%) of 197,473 participants reported job strain. In 1·49 million person-years at risk (mean follow-up 7·5 years [SD 1·7]), we recorded 2358 events of incident coronary heart disease. After adjustment for sex and age, the hazard ratio for job strain versus no job strain was 1·23 (95% CI 1·10-1·37). This effect estimate was higher in published (1·43, 1·15-1·77) than unpublished (1·16, 1·02-1·32) studies. Hazard ratios were likewise raised in analyses addressing reverse causality by exclusion of events of coronary heart disease that occurred in the first 3 years (1·31, 1·15-1·48) and 5 years (1·30, 1·13-1·50) of follow-up. We noted an association between job strain and coronary heart disease for sex, age groups, socioeconomic strata, and region, and after adjustments for socioeconomic status, and lifestyle and conventional risk factors. The population attributable risk for job strain was 3·4%. INTERPRETATION: Our findings suggest that prevention of workplace stress might decrease disease incidence; however, this strategy would have a much smaller effect than would tackling of standard risk factors, such as smoking. FUNDING: Finnish Work Environment Fund, the Academy of Finland, the Swedish Research Council for Working Life and Social Research, the German Social Accident Insurance, the Danish National Research Centre for the Working Environment, the BUPA Foundation, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment, the Medical Research Council, the Wellcome Trust, and the US National Institutes of Health.

Job strain and tobacco smoking: an individual-participant data meta-analysis of 166,130 adults in 15 European studies.

BACKGROUND: Tobacco smoking is a major contributor to the public health burden and healthcare costs worldwide, but the determinants of smoking behaviours are poorly understood. We conducted a large individual-participant meta-analysis to examine the extent to which work-related stress, operationalised as job strain, is associated with tobacco smoking in working adults. METHODOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We analysed cross-sectional data from 15 European studies comprising 166,130 participants. Longitudinal data from six studies were used. Job strain and smoking were self-reported. Smoking was harmonised into three categories never, ex- and current. We modelled the cross-sectional associations using logistic regression and the results pooled in random effects meta-analyses. Mixed effects logistic regression was used to examine longitudinal associations. Of the 166,130 participants, 17% reported job strain, 42% were never smokers, 33% ex-smokers and 25% current smokers. In the analyses of the cross-sectional data, current smokers had higher odds of job strain than never-smokers (age, sex and socioeconomic position-adjusted odds ratio: 1.11, 95% confidence interval: 1.03, 1.18). Current smokers with job strain smoked, on average, three cigarettes per week more than current smokers without job strain. In the analyses of longitudinal data (1 to 9 years of follow-up), there was no clear evidence for longitudinal associations between job strain and taking up or quitting smoking. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings show that smokers are slightly more likely than non-smokers to report work-related stress. In addition, smokers who reported work stress smoked, on average, slightly more cigarettes than stress-free smokers.