HEALTH STATUS AMONG WORKERS FROM A CATERING COMPANY: ASSOCIATION BETWEEN SUBJECTIVE AND OBJECTIVE MEASURES

Introduction: The work environment is crucial for health promotion, making it essential to conduct health assessments of workers to reduce absenteeism and ensure safe workplaces. Objectives: Characterize subjective health measures (occupational stress, self-perception of health, occupational motivation) and examine their association with objective health measures (BMI, blood pressure, basal glucose, basal cholesterol) among workers in a catering company. Method: A total of 163 participants from a Portuguese catering company were included. Subjective measures were collected via an Microsoft Forms questionnaire, and objective indicators were measured by trained nurses. Data was collected in March 2023 and analyzed using descriptive statistics, cluster analysis, and logistic regression in SPSS. Results: Showed 43.6% of participants reported high work- related stress, 84% felt physically better than the previous year, and there was satisfaction across all dimensions of professional motivation. Significant differences were found between occupational stress and satisfaction with supervision, physical environment, benefits, participation, and intrinsic factors. Conclusion: Characterizing the health status of participants was useful for guiding activities of the occupational health department, aligning with existing epidemiological studies. Addressing occupational stress in organizations is crucial, as it affects employee motivation and productivity. No significant differences were found between objective and subjective health measures.