The delicate fight against cardiovascular risks at work

The employees concerned had no major risk factors. They didn’t have high cholesterol, weren’t obese, didn’t smoke, weren’t diabetic. And yet they had, in recent years, a stroke. Enough to question their occupational health service when it received them for consultation.

The analysis of these cases allowed the doctors to find a common denominator: all worked extremely hard. Was there a link between an intense work rhythm and a risk of stroke? Scientific studies would confirm this some time later. “It’s a small but significant risk”explains today Alexis D’Escatha, professor of occupational health at the University Hospital of Angers, who has conducted research on the subject.

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“Working extensively in conditions that are not always optimal can have a direct effect on heart rate, blood pressure, but also indirect effects on sleep or diet. » Prolonged work has thus joined the long list of factors of cardiovascular pathologies already identified within organizations (poor food in the canteen, for example).

Preventive actions

In fact, cardiologists and occupational medicine are now warning about their large number and the need to carry out preventive actions in the workplace. Some of these factors only moderately increase the occurrence of cardiac pathologies. But their multiplicity is worrying, as is their complexity and the difficulty of understanding their consequences, each threat being associated, as is the case for the significant extension of working time, with a tangle of direct and indirect effects.

This is also observed for shift work with night shifts. “It entails a significant metabolic risk, explains cardiologist Claire Mounier-Véhier. Employees sleep badly and not enough, which increases the risk of a heart attack or stroke. At the same time, they tend to snack at night to keep up, to gain weight, and to be more stressed. »

Particularly harmful consequences, which add up to risk situations for the cardiovascular system. The same goes for a sedentary lifestyle, the threat of which has increased with the development of teleworking. Being several hours a day in a seated position increases the pathologies of overweight, arterial hypertension or diabetes.

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