The aim of the research visit was to continue the co-operation in the field of working time research with Dr Anne Marit Wöhrmann. The co-operation was started during Anne Marit´s PEROSH research exchange visit to FIOH (12-16.11.2018). After Anne Marit´s visit, our co-operation has progressed as planned; we submitted an abstract of our preliminary parallel analysis to the Shiftwork2019 conference (24th International Symposium on Shiftwork and Working Time of the Working Time Society, 9.-13.9.2019, Couer d’Alene, USA) and have the abstract accepted for the conference.
In addition to conducting the preliminary parallel analysis, we have drafted a joint article plan from German and Finnish employees using the BAuA-Working Time Survey (BWTS) and the FPS Survey from employees in Finland as well as register data on their realized working hours (WHFPS).
We conducted a parallel analysis using the BWTS and WHFPS datasets and agreed about the final statistical models to be included in the joint article. The working title of the article is “The role of the organization of working time and space for employees’ health and work-life balance in the health care sector”. Our aim is to finalize the analysis and writing of the manuscript so that it would be submitted to a Shiftwork2019 -special issue in Chronobiology International shortly after the Shiftwork2019 conference.
For the second day of my visit, Anne Marit organized a second BAuA-FIOH symposium on working time research, where I had the opportunity to shortly present FIOH in general and present our recent research results and the most interesting on-going projects and main future interests. Several researchers form BAuA working time group presented their current projects and results as well. My colleagues from FIOH also had the opportunity to take part in the symposium via Skype. After the presentations, we had a fruitful discussion about shared interests and possibilities to arrange future meetings and research applications.
During my visit, we also drafted a symposium proposal for the EAOHP2020 conference (European Academy of Occupational Health Psychology, 6.-8.4.2020, Cyprus) regarding working times in the health care sector. The suggested symposium presenters besides ourselves will likely be invited from France and the United Kingdom.
To further continue our co-operation, we also discussed writing another scientific article, based on parallel follow-up data from both WHFPS and BWTS, which both will have the next data wave ready in spring 2020.
In my opinion, the one-week visit to BAuA was both interesting and successful.
I would like to thank PEROSH for supporting this research staff exchange.
Kati Karhula, PhD, Specialist researcher
Finnish Institute of Occupational Health
Topeliuksenkatu 41B
00250 Helsinki
Finland
kati.karhula@ttl.fi
+358 43 824 2267
