The Effect of Work Stress and Its Relationship with Employee Health at Sunyani West NHIS

Abstract

This study was conducted to assess the effect of work stress and its relationship with employee health at Sunyani West National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS). The study revealed that factors that bring about stress include lack of training to make work easier, work demands that outweigh abilities, working under poor working conditions, the risk factor associated with the work of employees, working under pressure from superior and dissatisfaction with job. Also, it was revealed that there exist a significant negative relationship between work related stress and workers health (β-value=-0.480, p-value=.003) as well as a significant negative relationship between stress and employee job performance (β-value=-0.500, p-value=.003). Lastly, the study depicts  how stress was manage at Sunyani West NHIS which include; ability to take mind off things, involvement in exercises, employee ability to understand their situation, control of situation, keeping health in check, eating of healthy diet, talking over problems with colleagues at work, personally manage of feelings and emotions and seeking for distractions to reduce pressure. The study recommended that Sunyani West NHIS should invest in work stress issues which in return can pay huge dividends both in terms of reduced stress-related costs, and increased job performance. It also recommended that research be done on non-work stress or both work stress and non-work stress and their influence on employee’s health and job performance. Keywords: Stress, Occupational stress, Employee health, Job performance, and Stress Management.