Observational Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2021. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Clin Cases. Sep 6, 2021; 9(25): 7391-7404
Published online Sep 6, 2021. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v9.i25.7391
Is burnout a mediating factor between sharps injury and work-related factors or musculoskeletal pain?
Yong-Hsin Chen, Chin-Feng Tsai, Chih-Jung Yeh, Gwo-Ping Jong
Yong-Hsin Chen, Chih-Jung Yeh, Department of Public Health, Chung Shan Medical University, Taichung 40201, Taiwan
Yong-Hsin Chen, Department of Occupational Safety and Health, Chung Shan Medical University Hospital, Taichung 40201, Taiwan
Chin-Feng Tsai, Division of Cardiology, Department of Internal Medicine, Chung Shan Medical University Hospital, Taichung 40201, Taiwan
Chin-Feng Tsai, School of Medicine, Chung Shan Medical University, Taichung 40201, Taiwan
Gwo-Ping Jong, Department of Internal Medicine, Chung Shan Medical University Hospital and Chung Shan Medical University, Taichung 40201, Taiwan
Author contributions: Chen YH and Yeh CJ conceived and designed this manuscript; Jong GP and Yeh CJ analyzed and interpreted the data of this study; Chen YH wrote the original draft; Jong GP and Yeh CJ reviewed and edited the manuscript; Jong GP and Yeh CJ also share equal contribution; all authors were contributed to drafting and/or revising the article; and all authors approved the final version to be published.
Institutional review board statement: Approval of the research protocol: The study protocol was approved by the institutional review board of Chung Shan Medical University Hospital on July 22, 2020 (CSMUH No: CS19150).
Informed consent statement: Written consent was not obtained from the study participants as only de-identified data were obtained, and a waiver of patient consent was provided by the Ethics Committee for this study.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no other conflicts of interest for this article.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE statement, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE statement.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Chih-Jung Yeh, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Public Health, Chung Shan Medical University, No. 110 Section 1, Chien-Kuo Road, Taichung 40201, Taiwan. alexyeh@csmu.edu.tw
Received: April 21, 2021
Peer-review started: April 21, 2021
First decision: May 24, 2021
Revised: June 1, 2021
Accepted: July 27, 2021
Article in press: July 27, 2021
Published online: September 6, 2021
Processing time: 131 Days and 23.1 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: Burnout affects approximately half of all nurses, physicians, and other clinicians. Sharps injuries, which frequently occur among health care workers, constitute a critical problem. Our study found burnout was determined to contribute to sharps injuries occurrence; specifically, it mediated the relationships of sharps injuries with frequent musculoskeletal pain, overtime work, and irregular shift work. Results from the present study suggest that if the problem of burnout is ignored, training or safe operation may not be sufficient to effectively prevent work-related injuries. To the best of our knowledge, this finding has never been reported.