Self-employed women really can have hearts that young male bosses can only envy them, states a new study

Surveying 4682 working women in the U. S, the study showed that women who is self-employed are likely to exercise more and have lower chances of being obese or have hypertension or diabetes which are factors that put one at risk of developing heart disease further.

The conclusions made by the study do not make it easy to suggest that self-employment promotes better health, experts said. However they do pose the question of whether or not there are aspects of self-employment that can in fact be good for the heart of a woman as posed by senior researcher Dr. Kimberly Narain.

She added that such work design might give women more flexibility as to how to organize the day’s work – or, in this case, incorporate a workout.

While admitting that not all women can or wish to become self employed, Narain said it may be possible for employers to adapt some of the positive aspects of self employment to the conventional work setting.

One example may include flexibility in the daily time table which was suggested by Narain, a physician working with University of California, Los Angeles Women’s Health Center.

“It can be shocking to find out that heart disease kills more women than anything else, which many people do not know,” she said.

But in addition to the traditional markers for cardiovascular disease, there are other ‘atypical’ precursors, according to Narain, including depression and chronic stress.

Since individuals spend so much of their time at work, she added, it is rather helpful to learn how the organisational setting can assist individuals in practicing a healthy lifestyle.

“What I desire is to think about how structures can be transformed,” Narain said ‘rather than, incessantly telling women to transform. ”

The results of the recent study are derived from the National Health Interview Survey conducted on the US adults in 2016 as posted in the BMC Women’s Health journal. It included 4,624 women who were employed: 16% said that they owned a business that was incorporated while the remaining said that they worked for someone else.

In general, self-employed women were more physically active: SCF: 80% said they exercised at least twice a week, compared with 72% of other women. Less likely to be obese 32%, have high blood pressure 19%, or diabetes 11. 5% as compared to 41%, 28%, and 14% respectively of respondents who were ever married.

However, it becomes very hard to determine which came first, like admittedly stated by Yana Rodgers, the faculty director of the Center for Women and Work at Rutgers University in Piscataway New Jersey.

It would mean that women who are in a position to freelance or become their own bosses would probably be more well off or possess other assets as compared to the other women, said Rodgers, who was not involved in the study.

Regarding possible confounding factors including the participants education level, employment status, and their marital status, Narain’s team tried to control for all these factors that in one way or the other could have influenced the outcome of the study. They also factored in access to health care: Some of the important findings include; Self-employed women may choose to work without health insurance because it is costly, Narain said.

It also means they may not have other conditions such as hypertension or diabetes for instance diagnosed. It also means that self-employment may not be possible for women who, for instance, suffer from chronic illnesses or have poor financial capacity.

It turned out that self-employed women in the study were, in fact, more likely to be uninsured: 9% were, compared with 5% of other women. But that did not put into consideration the disparity that existed in the two people’s health state.

Self employed women were 30% to 43% less likely to have high blood pressure or diabetes and 68% more likely to be exercising at least two times per week.

There is a loophole, however, that the researchers failed to consider and this is the household income, according to Rodgers. When the family income is high and steady the woman being could be in a better station to establish his/her own business enterprise.

Even if that is the case, though, Rodgers agreed that self-employment may well have health-supporting perks: Self-employed women might work long hours, they also probably take more control over where, when, and how they are working.

Rodgers also added, “I think employers should pay attention to findings such as these. ” “They could reflect on possibilities of wider decision-making powers, as well as more freedom at the choice of hours to work. ”

She said even small changes such as ‘walk and talk’ instead of the conventional ‘keyword’ meetings could facilitate people to incorporate more movement into their workday.

There are employers, as pointed out by Narain, may well believe that schedules which do not allow discretion causes the bottom line. She said if employees are more stressed, less satisfied or less healthy that may not be so.

More information

The American Heart Association has more on working health.

SOURCES: Dr. Kimberly Narain Internal Medicine Physician Assistant Professor in Residence UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine, July 23, 2022 online; Dr Yana Rodgers, Faculty Director, Rutgers Center for Women and Work, Professor, Department of Labor Studies and Employment Relations, Rutgers University, Piscataway, N. J,July 23, 2022 online; BMC Women’s Health