Physiological and psychosocial occupational exposures and intermediate health outcomes in the general population

In this large general working population-based thesis, we observed that pesticides is the most potent occupational exposure that may impair lung function and may increase the risk to develop respiratory symptoms and airway obstruction. Metals exposure may increase the prevalence of sickness absence among workers. Experiencing high job strain and high effort-reward imbalance in the workplace may increase blood pressure. Future studies should consider to include a detailed job history to detect the health effects of occupational exposures over the life course. In addition, future research should focus on the causal associations between occupational exposures and health effects through genetic and epigenetic analyses. The results of these future studies may point towards future preventive and therapeutic measures. Targeted preventive measures should be implemented to protect workers from exposure to pesticides and its components, metals, job strain, and effort-reward imbalance to ensure healthy working lives.