This review article aims to anatomize sources of the healthy worker effect (HWE) and to summarize advantages and limitations of several approaches frequently proposed to eliminate the HWE. Although the HWE is frequently addressed in the context of selection bias, our review suggests that the selection of occupational cohorts with advantageous health status would preferably be addressed as a source of confounding biases. The authors also conclude that the exclusion of unhealthy workers at employment and the study of active workers are the two main sources of HWE, and that the use of the general population as a comparison group in occupational epidemiology should be avoided if possible. The authors encourage investigators to make distinctions between the underlying factors related to the use of the general population as the comparison group in occupational epidemiology.

OBJECTIVE Type 2 diabetes confers a greater excess risk of cardiovascular disease in women than in men. Diabetes is also a risk factor for dementia, but whether the association is similar in women and men remains unknown. We performed a meta-analysis of unpublished data to estimate the sex-specific relationship between women and men with diabetes with incident dementia. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS A systematic search identified studies published prior to November 2014 that had reported on the prospective association between diabetes and dementia. Study authors contributed unpublished sex-specific relative risks (RRs) and 95% CIs on the association between diabetes and all dementia and its subtypes. Sex-specific RRs and the women-to-men ratio of RRs (RRRs) were pooled using random-effects meta-analyses. RESULTS Study-level data from 14 studies, 2,310,330 individuals, and 102,174 dementia case patients were included. In multiple-adjusted analyses, diabetes was associated with a 60% increased risk of any dementia in both sexes (women: pooled RR 1.62 [95% CI 1.45–1.80]; men: pooled RR 1.58 [95% CI 1.38–1.81]). The diabetes-associated RRs for vascular dementia were 2.34 (95% CI 1.86–2.94) in women and 1.73 (95% CI 1.61–1.85) in men, and for nonvascular dementia the RRs were 1.53 (95% CI 1.35–1.73) in women and 1.49 (95% CI 1.31–1.69) in men. Overall, women with diabetes had a 19% greater risk for the development of vascular dementia than men (multiple-adjusted RRR 1.19 [95% CI 1.08–1.30]; P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS Individuals with type 2 diabetes are at ∼60% greater risk for the development of dementia compared with those without diabetes. For vascular dementia, but not for nonvascular dementia, the additional risk is greater in women.

Objectives To explore the prevalence and associated factors of burnout among five different medical professions in a regional teaching hospital. Design Cross-sectional study. Setting Hospital-based survey. Participants A total of 1329 medical professionals were recruited in a regional hospital with a response rate of 89%. These voluntary participants included 101 physicians, 68 physician assistants, 570 nurses, 216 medical technicians and 374 administrative staff. Primary and secondary outcome measures Demographic data included gender, age, level of education and marital status, and work situations, such as position, work hours and work shifts, were obtained from an electronic questionnaire. Job strain and burnout were measured by two validated questionnaires, the Chinese version of the Job Content Questionnaire and the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory. Results Among the five medical professions, the prevalence of high work-related burnout from highest to lowest was nurses (66%), physician assistants (61.8%), physicians (38.6%), administrative staff (36.1%) and medical technicians (31.9%), respectively. Hierarchical regression analysis indicated that job strain, overcommitment and low social support explained the most variance (32.6%) of burnout. Conclusions Physician assistant is an emerging high burnout group; its severity is similar to that of nurses and far more than that of physicians, administrative staff and medical technicians. These findings may contribute to the development of feasible strategies to reduce the stress which results in the burnout currently plaguing most hospitals in Taiwan.

OBJECTIVE—To study the effect of birth weight on risk of type 2 diabetes in the schoolchildren in Taiwan. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS—From 1992 to 1997, all schoolchildren aged 6–18 years were screened for diabetes in Taiwan Province. This cohort consisted of 1,966 patients with diabetes and 1,780 randomly selected subjects with normal fasting glycemia (NFG). Questionnaire interviewing was designed to classify diabetes. The birth weight was obtained from the Taiwan’s Birth Registry. After merging the data, there were 978 subjects, including 429 with type 2 diabetes and 549 with of NFG enrolled in the present analyses. RESULTS—The odds ratios (95% CI) for type 2 diabetes, after adjusting age, sex, BMI, family history of diabetes, and socioeconomic status, were 2.91 (1.25–6.76) for children with low birth weight (<2,500 g) and 1.78 (1.04–3.06) for those with high birth weight (≥4,000 g) when compared with the referent group (birth weight 3,000–3,499 g). The risk of diabetes was still 64% higher in the high birth weight group [odds ratio (OR) 1.64 (95% CI 0.91–2.96)], even after adjustment for gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM). Patients with type 2 diabetes who were born with high birth weight were more likely to have a higher BMI and diastolic blood pressure as well as a higher family history of diabetes compared with those with low birth weight. CONCLUSIONS—A U-shaped relationship between birth weight and risk of type 2 diabetes was found in the schoolchildren aged 6–18 years in Taiwan. Schoolchildren with type 2 diabetes who were born with low birth weight had different metabolic phenotypes compared with those born with high birth weight.

OBJECTIVE: We retrospectively assessed the age- and sex-specific incidence and relative risk of Parkinson disease (PD) in Taiwan’s diabetic population. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS: Study cohort included 603,416 diabetic patients and 472,188 nondiabetic control subjects. Incidence rate and relative risk of PD (ICD-9-CM 332.0) were evaluated. RESULTS: The incidence of PD was 3.59 and 2.15 per 10,000 person-years for the diabetic and control group, respectively, representing a covariate adjusted hazard ratio (HR) of 1.61 (95% CI 1.56–1.66), which was substantially reduced to 1.37 (1.32–1.41) after adjusting for medical visits. Diabetes was associated with a significantly elevated risk of PD in all sex and age stratifications except in young women, with the highest HR noted for young men aged 21–40 years (2.10 [1.01–4.42]), followed by women aged 41–60 (2.05 [1.82–2.30]) and >60 years (1.65 [1.58–1.73]). CONCLUSIONS: Diabetes is associated with an increased risk of PD onset in a Chinese population, and the relation is stronger in women and younger patients.