The effect of job stress on fertility, its intention, and infertility treatment among the workers: a systematic review.

INTRODUCTION

The effect of job stress on childbearing is an important but less known consequence. Three important agents for childbearing include fertility, its intention, and infertility treatment. The adverse effect of job stress on these agents remains controversial. Therefore, this systematic review study aimed to investigate the effect of job stress on them.

METHODS

Four electronic bibliographic databases, including Scopus, PubMed, Web of Science, and Embase were systematically searched up to 25 November 2023. The combinations of three groups of keywords were used. The first group of keywords included "job", "occup*, work, and indust* and the second group consisted of stress, distress, and strain. The third group of keywords comprised pregnancy rate, fertility, infertility, fecundability, and childlessness. Then, the articles were screened by researchers. In the next step, the researchers extracted the information from the selected papers. To assess their quality, critical appraisal tools of the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) were used.

RESULTS

Sixteen papers were entered into this study. Based on the results, job stress showed significant associations in 5 out of 8 studies on fertility, 3 out of 3 studies on fertility intention, and 6 out of 8 studies on infertility treatment process. Some probable mechanisms include the physiological effects of job stress on fertility, the effect of changed behavioral habits due to job stress on fertility, the psychological effects of job stress on fertility intention, and the effect of job stress on the infertility treatment process.

CONCLUSIONS

The results showed that job stress may affect fertility, its intention, and the infertility treatment process among people. Therefore, it is required that necessary measures are planned and performed to decrease job stress and strain in workplaces.