Is burnout a mediating factor between sharps injury and work-related factors or musculoskeletal pain?

BACKGROUND: Burnout, musculoskeletal pain, and sharps injuries (SIs) affect medical workers. AIM: To establish a model between SIs, burnout, and the risk factors to assess the extent to which burnout affects SIs. METHODS: This questionnaire was used for an observational and cross-sectional study, which was based on members at a hospital affiliated with a medical university in Taichung, Taiwan, in 2020. The valid responses constituted 68.5% (1734 of 2531). The items were drawn from the Nordic Musculoskeletal Questionnaire and Copenhagen burnout inventory and concerned work experience, occupational category, presence of chronic diseases, sleep duration, overtime work, and work schedule. Factor analysis, chi-square test, Fisher exact test, Multiple linear, logistic regression and Sobel test were conducted. The present analyses were performed using SAS Enterprise Guide 6.1 software (SAS Institute Inc., Cary, NC, United States), and significance was set at P < 0.05. RESULTS: Personal and work-related burnout ranks, sex, work experience ranks, occupational groups, drinking in the past month, sleep duration per day, presence of chronic diseases, overtime work ranks, and work schedule were associated with SIs. Frequent upper limb and lower limb pain (pain occurring every day or once a week) determined to be related to SIs. High personal burnout (> Q3) and high work-related burnout (> Q3) mediated the relationship between SIs and frequent lower limb pain. Similarly, frequent lower limb pain mediated the relationship of SIs with high personal and high work-related burnout. High personal and high work-related burnout mediated the relationships of SIs with overtime work and irregular shift work. The mediating model provides strong evidence of an association between mental health and SIs. CONCLUSION: Burnout was determined to contribute to SIs occurrence; specifically, it mediated the relationships of SIs with frequent musculoskeletal pain, overtime work, and irregular shift work.