Revista nº 807

Ranchal-Sánchez et al. Progressive ageing of hospital working population Actualidad Médica · Número 807 · Mayo/Agosto 2019 Páginas 92 a 97 · 93 · INTRODUCTION Demographic studies are usually prepared based on data from official regional (1), national (2), or transnational (3) statistics institutes, while the number of studies that show working population pyramid data are relatively few. The general data show that Europe is ageing (4). In Spain there are official statistics obtained from the municipal residents registers and the national census. The last census (2), carried out in 2011, showed that 25% of the population were aged over 50. The forecasts estimated an average age of between 45 and 59 for the working population during that decade (5). Analysing the labour demographics of a place of work where large numbers of people are employed may be useful for gaining a picture of the contemporary labour structure and to observe its evolution, serving as a guide for hospitals of a similar size in developed countries. In the case of regional referral hospitals, the scope of influence encompasses the citizens of the province and the surrounding geographic area, catering for populations of over one million. On the other hand, the legislation in place in Spain establishes that monitoring collective health must form part of the daily activities of prevention services (6). In addition to classic epidemiological studies (7), we can consider others such as demographic studies. It is interesting to ascertain how the labour force is distributed by age and sex, with special attention on the qualitatively predominant labour category, such as nursing. There are hardly any demographic studies carried out in the labour environment in the scientific literature. The main objective of the study is to draw up a labour population pyramid of a referral hospital in the south of Spain in order to describe, analyse, share the predominance of nursing and observe its evolution over the last decade based on the hospital's annual report. METHODOLOGY Design For the demographic analysis of the labour population, a cross-cutting transversal epidemiological study was carried out. Area of study The area of study is the working population of a regional hospital in the south of Spain (European Union), and the period of study was January 2017. Population and sample The population study looked at all the employees of the referral hospital analysed, dependent on the Health Service of Andalusia, which at the time of the study consisted of a total of 5,450 employees, making it the largest employer in the province in which it is located. Of total hospital staff, the majority (52.3%) belong to the nursing division, 27.4% are non-healthcare staff and 20.3% belong to the medical division. Criteria for inclusion and exclusion The criterion for inclusion was a direct contractual relationship with the hospital, including personnel with temporary contracts at the time of the study. For the nursing population, both degree and diploma graduates were considered along with middle and senior managers. Neither matrons nor nursing assistants were included in the nursing population as they belong to another professional category. The criterion for exclusion was the absence a contract with the hospital due to being employed by an external company, such as cleaning staff. Sources for collection of data The population structure was compiled based on an anonymous database built from the transfer of data registered on winmedtra , the software used for workplace health exams, which included the entire working population of the hospital. The data for the analysis of the evolution of the working population were obtained from the 2006 annual report, prepared in the same regional hospital (8). Data analysis The total population and the nursing population were quantified using absolute and relative data and the age and sex variables using the Excel program of the Microsoft Office package, officially licensed through the University of Córdoba. Based on this data, tables were composed; one with the total population and another with the nursing population, dividing the staff by five-year age brackets from 25 to 65 along with the two extremes: <25: 25-30; 31-35; 36-40; 41-45; 46-50; 51-55; 56-60; 61-65 and >65. The graphics of the working population pyramid were comprised using the data from the tables. For the <25 and >65 age brackets, the Excel function COUNTIF was used for the “age” column using the <25 and >65 data so that only the data for those aged 24 or younger of 66 or over were included. In the rest of the age brackets, the Excel function COUNTIFS was used selecting the above data, and so on for each of the corresponding age brackets. To compile the nursing population table, the same Excel function was used but only for “A.T.S/D.U.E.” graduates. For the classification of staff by age and sex, in percentages, the function COUNTIFS was used for the “age” and “sex” columns in all sections. For the purpose of relating the young and mature population an index was comprised where the numerator was made up of the number of employees under 30+100 and the total denominator of the 30 to 50 bracket. The femininity index and the average age of the population analysed was also calculated. Ethical considerations The study was developed within the framework of a research project titled “Interventions to promote active and healthy ageing in the workplace based on the model for action on working capacity” which meets with the express approval of the corresponding ethical committee. The database was anonymized to meet the relevant legislation (9), as part of a final year degree dissertation with shared authorship between the first two signatories of this article. RESULTS The average age of the hospital population when analysed in 2017 was 50.12, and that of the nursing staff was 49.78. The 2006 report showed an average age of 45 for all staff. The index proposed to compare the young population with the adult population was 15.48% for the total population (313*100/2022), having been 9.86% in 2005 (313*100/3174). Table 1 (next page) shows the distribution of the total working population of the hospital by age bracket, with absolute and relative data, differentiated by sex. Access for people aged over 50. The femininity index obtained for the total working population was 73.47% (4004*100/5450), having stood at 70.37% in the 2006 report (3549*100/5043). In order to immediately visualize the structure of the total population of the hospital, we compile the corresponding pyramid (figure 1, next page). We observe an asymmetric inverted pyramid with a narrow base, heavily female dominant in all age