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BACKGROUND: In 2012, the Florida Department of Health added questions about industry and occupation of employed persons to the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS). The BRFSS is a nationwide telephone survey administered by each state to obtain state/local level estimates of the populations’ health indicators. This descriptive analysis examined health indicators of employees across select industries.
METHODS: The question, “What kind of business or industry do you work in?” was asked of landline respondents who were employed within the last year. For this analysis, industry was examined by the North American Industry Classification System. Due to sample size issues, only select industries were examined (i.e. accommodations, construction, education, health care, government, professional/scientific/technical services and retail). There were 7,624 respondents to the 2012 Florida BRFSS survey. Of these, 6,241 were interviewed via landline. Of the 3,255 employed landline respondents, 684 responses were coded for industry.
RESULTS: Of the industries examined, health care workers were the least likely to smoke daily (2.1%), whereas those in the accommodations industry were the most likely to smoke daily (41.2%). Binge drinking was least common among government workers (2.4%) and most common among construction workers (49.9%). The highest proportion of overweight/obese workers were employed in the retail industry (87.5%) and in government (86.2%). The lowest proportion of overweight/obese workers were employed in education (51.6%). Construction workers were the least likely to have health insurance (45.8%), least likely to have had a routine checkup in the last year (29.3%), and the most likely to report not being able to attain medical care due to cost (41.7%). Government workers were the most likely to have health insurance (99.4%) and the least likely to report not being able to attain medical care due to cost (7.4%). Health care workers were the most likely to have had a routine checkup in the last year (83.9%).
CONCLUSIONS: Construction workers have less access to health care and a higher proportion of certain risk factors than government or health care workers. Despite limitations with sample size, the data indicate differences in health indicators across industries and demonstrate the value of continuing to include these questions on the BRFSS. Additional data obtained in the coming years will allow for more accurate estimates of health indicators among workers and additional analysis among subgroups of this population. Having state-level data by industry will help target health promotion and intervention efforts.