Self-rated recovery from work stress and allostatic load in women

Objective: The objective of this study was to investigate the relationships between self-rated recovery from work stress and biologic dysregulation in terms of allostatic load (AL) and individual biomarkers, respectively, in healthy women within the public health care sector. Methods: Two hundred forty-one women completed self-ratings of recovery and took part in a standardized medical examination, which provided individual biomarkers that were used to compute AL. Results: Cluster analysis of self-rated recovery resulted in three cluster profiles, including (1) recovered women (n=108), (2) nonrecovered women (n=51), and (3) fatigued women (n=82). Sequential logistic regression analysis showed that the fatigued profile had an increased risk for high AL. In contrast, there was no significant difference in individual biomarkers between recovery profiles. Conclusions: The findings establish an association between biologic processes and self-rated recovery from work stress, thus supporting the hypothesis that insufficient recovery may result in high AL. (c) 2006 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.