Work absence due to musculoskeletal disorders among basic education teachers in Brazil

Abstract Objective: to investigate factors associated with work absence due to musculoskeletal disorders among teachers of Brazilian basic education. Methods: a cross-sectional study, which used a probabilistic and representative sample of the major regions of Brazil. Through telephone interviews, a questionnaire was applied to collect socio-demographic information on health status, work absences, and characteristics of teaching work. Poisson regression with robust variance was used to estimate prevalence ratios (PR) and 95% confidence intervals (95%CI). Results: among the 6,510 participating teachers (63.2% female), the prevalence of leave due to musculoskeletal disorders was 14.7% (16.5% among women and 11.7% among men). The results indicated an association between absence and indiscipline in the classroom (female = PR: 1.36; 95%CI: 1.11;1.67; male = PR: 1.35; 95%CI: 1.02;1.78 ), verbal violence committed by students (female = PR: 1.16; 95%CI: 1.01;1.35; male = PR: 1.54; 95%CI: 1.22;1.95) and high professional tasks demands (female = PR: 1.17; 95%CI: 1.01;1.36; male = PR: 1.27; 95%CI: 1.01;1.60). Conclusion: the factors associated with work absences due to musculoskeletal disorders are related to teachers’ exposure to work overload and stressful school environments.