Determination of Menopausal Influence on Work Productivity among Health Workers in Public Hospitals in Kiambu County, Kenya

Aims: Menopause is a normal process in women marked by a reduction in estrogen and progesterone levels and eventual cessation of menstruation. Despite many studies on menopause, influence of menopause on work productivity and performance are poorly documented. The study sought to established the influence of menopause on work productivity among health workers. In this study, menopausal women refer to those in either of the four stages associated with menopause.

Study Design: The study adopted case-control study design.

Methodology: A total of 478 women working in public hospitals in the study area and aged between 40-60 years were selected for study where 239 were the case study group with menopause related symptoms and the control group was 239 women who were in same age but had no menopause related symptoms. In total, those aged 40-45 were 139, while those aged 45-50 and 50-55 were each 124 in number and those aged 55-60 were 91 in number The study used mixed-methods approach; Simple random sampling was used to select study respondents while purposive sampling was employed in selecting 20 key informants. A semi- structured questionnaire was used to collect data from the study respondents while an interview guide was used to interview key informants. SPSS version 20 was used to analyze quantitative data. Descriptive statistics, cross-tabulation, chi-square and regression analysis were used to analyze the quantitative data collected while thematic analysis of qualitative data using NVIVO software.

Results: The findings show that menopause was associated with work absenteeism (χ2=21.549, p=0.001) and productivity impairment (χ2=76.979, p=0.001). Regression analysis showed that nervousness (p=0.005, df=1, OR=7.909), lack of concentration (p=.032, df=1, OR=4.608), breathing difficulties (p=0.010, df=1, OR=6.587) and anorexia (p=0.09, df=1, OR=6.880) increased work productivity impairment.

Conclusion: Menopause impairs work productivity and increases work absenteeism. There is need for work places to adopt measures for supporting menopausal women to improve work productivity and to mitigate its adverse effects particularly, recognizing menopause as a workplace issue. This requires organizations to develop and institutionalize appropriate policies and staff support programs to support women during menopause transition and improve their work productivity.