TY - JOUR
T1 - Cross-national comparison of two general population job exposure matrices for physical work exposures
AU - Evanoff, Bradley
AU - Yung, Marcus
AU - Buckner-Petty, Skye
AU - Baca, Matthew
AU - Andersen, Johan Hviid
AU - Roquelaure, Yves
AU - Descatha, Alexis
AU - Dale, Ann Marie
N1 - Funding Information:
Funding this study was supported by research funding from the american national institute for Occupational Safety and Health (niOSH r01OH011076). the French cOnStanceS cohort is supported by the French national research agency (anr-11-inBS-0002), caisse nationale d’assurance Maladie des travailleurs salariés-cnaMtS and is funded by the institut de recherche en Santé Publique/institut thématique Santé Publique and the following sponsors: Ministère de la santé et des sports, Ministère délégué à la recherche, institut national de la santé et de la recherche médicale, institut national du cancer et caisse nationale de solidarité pour l’autonomie, as well as institute for research in public health (ireSP, capacit project).
Publisher Copyright:
© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2019. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.
PY - 2019/8/1
Y1 - 2019/8/1
N2 - Objectives Job exposure matrices (JEMs) are increasingly used to estimate physical workplace exposures. We conducted a cross-national comparison of exposure estimates from two general population JEMs to aid the interpretation of exposure-outcome associations across countries and to explore the feasibility of cross-national application of JEMs to provide workplace physical exposure estimates. Methods We compared physical exposure estimates from two general population JEMs created from the FrenchCohorte des consultants des Centres d'examens de santé study (27 exposure variables) and the American Occupational Information Network database (21 exposure variables). These exposure variables were related to physical demands or ergonomic risk factors for musculoskeletal disorders. We used a crosswalk to match French Profession et Catégorie Sociale job codes with American Standard Occupational Classification job codes and calculated Spearman's correlations and Cohen's kappa values for exposure variable pairs between these French and American JEMs. We defined a priori 50 matched French and American JEM variable pairs that measured similar exposures. Results All variable pairs measuring similar physical exposures demonstrated positive correlations. Among the 50 matched pairs, 33 showed high correlation (ρ≥0.70) and 46 showed at least moderate agreement (κ≥0.41). Exposures expected to be mutually exclusive (manual work vs office work) showed strongly negative correlations. Conclusions French and American general population physical exposure JEMs were related, sharing moderate to high association and moderate to substantial agreement between the majority of variable pairs measuring similar exposures. These findings will inform cross-national comparisons of study results and support some uses of general population JEMs outside their countries of origin.
AB - Objectives Job exposure matrices (JEMs) are increasingly used to estimate physical workplace exposures. We conducted a cross-national comparison of exposure estimates from two general population JEMs to aid the interpretation of exposure-outcome associations across countries and to explore the feasibility of cross-national application of JEMs to provide workplace physical exposure estimates. Methods We compared physical exposure estimates from two general population JEMs created from the FrenchCohorte des consultants des Centres d'examens de santé study (27 exposure variables) and the American Occupational Information Network database (21 exposure variables). These exposure variables were related to physical demands or ergonomic risk factors for musculoskeletal disorders. We used a crosswalk to match French Profession et Catégorie Sociale job codes with American Standard Occupational Classification job codes and calculated Spearman's correlations and Cohen's kappa values for exposure variable pairs between these French and American JEMs. We defined a priori 50 matched French and American JEM variable pairs that measured similar exposures. Results All variable pairs measuring similar physical exposures demonstrated positive correlations. Among the 50 matched pairs, 33 showed high correlation (ρ≥0.70) and 46 showed at least moderate agreement (κ≥0.41). Exposures expected to be mutually exclusive (manual work vs office work) showed strongly negative correlations. Conclusions French and American general population physical exposure JEMs were related, sharing moderate to high association and moderate to substantial agreement between the majority of variable pairs measuring similar exposures. These findings will inform cross-national comparisons of study results and support some uses of general population JEMs outside their countries of origin.
KW - biomechanical exposure assessment
KW - epidemiology
KW - ergonomics
KW - musculoskeletal disorders
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85063281316&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1136/oemed-2018-105408
DO - 10.1136/oemed-2018-105408
M3 - Article
C2 - 30894424
AN - SCOPUS:85063281316
SN - 1351-0711
VL - 76
SP - 567
EP - 572
JO - Occupational and Environmental Medicine
JF - Occupational and Environmental Medicine
IS - 8
ER -