Health-related quality of life, psychological status, and cardiovascular risk factors in intellectual workers

Aim. To study health-related quality of life (QoL), psychological status, and their associations with cardiovascular (CVD) risk factors (RFs) in education and science professionals, to specify the priorities of CVD prevention in organized collectives of intellectual workers.Material and methods. This preventive examination of two organized collectives of education and research workers assessed psycho-emotional status and health-related QoL. The examination was performed as a part of extended dispanserisation programme and included questionnaire survey, using such scales as HADS (anxiety and depression assessment), Reeder scale (stress assessment), and SF-36 (QoL).Results. The high prevalence of anxiety and depressive disorders pointed to increased CVD risk. Most traditional RFs positively correlated with depressive disorder severity. The two collectives examined were significantly different in terms of health-related QoL and some parameters of psycho-emotional stress. This could be partly explained by different workplace settings and social circumstances.Conclusion. In intellectual workers, CVD prevention should start with psycho-emotional and QoL correction, which could also improve the compliance to traditional RF correction.