Occupational health of employees with mental health issues: the role of the psychosocial working conditions, job crafting, and sense of coherence

BACKGROUND: The high prevalence of mental health issues (MHIs) among employees poses challenges for society. However, there is a lack of knowledge concerning the factors that influence their ability to stay, maintain productivity, and potentially thrive at work.OBJECTIVE: The aim of the study was to investigate individual (sense of coherence (SOC), job crafting), and work-related (psychosocial working conditions) factors that are associated with occupational health (work ability, work burnout and work engagement) among employees with MHIs controlling for socio-demographic and mental-health specific factors.METHODS: In a cross-sectional study employees with a current MHI from German-speaking countries were recruited. Hierarchical regression analyses with socio-demographic, mental-health specific, individual, and work-related factors as independent and occupational health outcomes as dependent variables were applied. RESULTS: The results showed that SOC and job resources were significantly related to all outcomes. In addition, job crafting tended to be associated only with positive outcomes (work ability and work engagement), whereas job demands only tended to be associated with burnout as a negative outcome. Moreover, mental health-specific factors (sickness absence and self-stigma) were negatively associated with work ability.CONCLISIONS: Personal resources (such as SOC) and job resources emerged as the most prominent factors for occupational health among employees with MHIs and should especially be strengthened in this group of individuals.