Prevalência de sintomas de depressão em trabalhadores de uma universidade pública

Abstract

Depression is increasingly becoming a worldwide public health problem, affecting millions of individuals, negatively affecting the lives of workers and their families, and contributing to the degradation of quality of life, lost productivity, reduced family income, and consequently to losses in the economic and social spherein many countries. Given the importance of conducting research in this area, both for treatment and for prevention of depressive disorders associated with work-related activity, the present study aimed to assess the prevalence of symptoms of depression in the Administrative-Technical Staff in Education (TAEs) at the Federal University of Juiz de Fora (UFJF), to outline their socioeconomic profile, identify symptoms of depression, and analyze the association between the socioeconomic profile and the symptoms of depression in these public servants. To this end, an epidemiological cross-sectional study with 828 TAE workers, aged between 20 and 68 years, was conducted. The data collection instrument was a self-administered questionnaire covering the symptoms of depression using the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9), general health status, and socioeconomic factors (gender, age, marital status, race, education level, religion, family income, presence of children and general health status). The data were processed using the statistical program, Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS), version 2.0.The results revealed that 28.8% of the women and 16.1% of the men showed symptoms of mild depression, the age group between 20 and 50 year shaving the highest prevalence. As to the general state of health, of the workers classified as very good and good, 15.5% and 25.6%, respectively, showed symptoms of mild depression. Thus, this study suggests the need to plan and execute preventive actions and programs for common mental disorders, such as depression, in order to minimize their impact on the quality of life and the work of federal public servants.