The differences of the economic losses due to presenteeism and treatment costs between high‐stress workers and non‐high‐stress workers using the stress check survey in Japan

OBJECTIVES: This study sought to examine differences in the economic losses due to presenteeism and costs of medical and dental treatment between high‐stress workers and non‐high‐stress workers using the stress check survey. METHODS: We conducted a cross‐sectional study from April 1, 2018 to March 31, 2019 in a pharmaceutical company. High‐stress workers were classified with the Brief Job Stress Questionnaire using two methods: the sum method and the score converted method. The incidence of presenteeism and its costs were determined using a questionnaire. The costs of medical and dental treatment were calculated according to claims. We compared the costs between high‐stress and non‐high‐stress workers using Wilcoxon's rank‐sum test. RESULTS: Of 3910 workers, 6.3% were classified as high‐stress using the sum method and 6.6% were classified as high‐stress using the score converted method. The costs associated with presenteeism and medical treatment among high‐stress workers were higher than the costs among non‐high‐stress workers, whereas the costs associated with dental treatment were not. CONCLUSIONS: To motivate employers to improve stressful work environments, it is recommended that presenteeism measurement items be added to the stress check survey, and that the methods used in this study be used to calculate the loss associated with high‐stress workers in Japanese companies. However, we must be careful in interpreting absolute presenteeism loss amounts because they are poorly reliable and valid.