Impact of Obesity on Absenteeism and Stress among Health Care Workers

0
Running Head: HEALTHCARE
Health care
Name of the student:
Name of the University:
Author’s note

1
Healthcare
Limitation
Considering the gaps or limitation in research process is necessary to demonstrate
reflectivity and transparency during the research process. This helps to identify scope of research
and future research actions needed to improve gaps in the process (Noyes et al., 2017). The first
limitation in the study was the lack of time as this prevented taking more research participants
and analyzing data in a more accurate way. The time frame given for the study was 9 weeks and
as qualitative research design was needed to fulfill the research aim, limited time resulted in
various adjustments in research design. The second limitation of the study was that only five
sample samples were selected for the study and response from such small sample size cannot
represent the view of all health care workers. Hence, such findings cannot be valid and reliable
unless the findings are compared with data from other settings. Thus, accuracy of the results was
seriously affected by low sample size. Faber and Fonseca (2014) argue that estimating accurate
sample size is important in research process as low sample size can contribute absolutely nothing
to improve practice.
To enhance the validity of the study, recruiting heterogeneous sample group such as
people from different countries or culture was necessary. However, in this research, all the
participants were Asian with 3 Philippine workers and 2 Nepalese workers. Participants in any
research should reflect diversity of culture by recruiting people with different age, race and
ethnicity. If cultural diversity is not maintained, it can lead to serious ethical and research
consequences. It may impede generalizing the study finding and it may prevent getting the
ultimate benefits from the research work. The quality of the research would have improved if
participants from different race, culture and age were taken. Time constraints were the main

2
Healthcare
contributing factor behind these limitations (LoBiondo-Wood et al., 2017). Thus, all these
limitations must be addressed in future research.
Recommendation:
After the analysis of the overall research findings, the researcher has come up with the
following recommendations to strengthen the quality and scope of this work and further
contribute to the goal of reducing absenteeism due to obesity in health care setting:
 All clinical managers in New Zealand must collaborate with health promotion staffs to
arrange for healthy lifestyle programmes that gives obese health care staffs the
opportunity to be physically active and get relief from stress too
 The Ministry of Health in New Zealand should develop healthy eating guidelines so that
obese workers could follow those guideline to maintain weight. It should also work on
revising the Obesity Plan so that more actions of obesity related absenteeism in
workplace could be taken
 The target population should engage in Zumba dance and other healthy activities which
will reduce the prevalence of obesity among the people.
 Swimming and gym also acts as two health conscious activities which can reduce the
prevalence of obesity.
Remedial actions:
Key remedial actions needed to address the problem of low productivity due to obesity
related absenteeism included immediate implementation of zero-tolerance policy to curb down
obesity related stigma and discrimination and applying for funding support so that health
promotion programs for workers could be arranged. Public health workers in the country must

3
Healthcare
focus on implementing obesity related campaigns so that productivity of obese people could be
improved. All health workers even those who are not aware should be encourage to provide
effective advice or emotional support to obese colleagues so that feelings of stress, frustration
and low self-esteem among obese workers are addressed. All health care institutions in New
Zealand must implement strict anti-obesity policy so that no obese colleagues feel burdened by
experience of stigma and discrimination due to weight issues in the organization. This will help
to control incidence of bullying and obesity related stigma and discrimination in work place and
ensure that obese workers get the right environment for quality work and productivity. All
clinical managers in New Zealand must plan implement obesity related education programmes in
hospital setting so that all health workers knows about the risk factors of obesity and the benefits
of physical activity on weight and overall well-being
Abstract:
Introduction: Obesity is a major issue in workplace because of the impact of obesity on stress
level of employees and absenteeism rates. The prevalence of obesity related absenteeism is high
in health care settings and understanding the cause behind it is important to prevents it impact on
patient safety and care delivery process. As there is lack of evidence on how health staff can
provide support to their obese colleagues, the main aim of the research was to evaluate the
perception of health care staffs regarding the impact of obesity on absenteeism and its affect on
stress.
Method: Qualitative research design using semi-structured interview method was used to get
answer to the research question. Five health care workers working in a health care institute of