The Continuum of Severity of Functional Impairment Due to Indoor Air Symptoms: Prevalence and Determinants
Open accessAbstract
Objective: The aim of the study is to study functional impairment due to indoor air–related symptoms and associated characteristics. Methods: A questionnaire survey of a random sample of Finnish people aged 25 to 64 years. Analyses were done using multivariate multinomial logistic regression. Results: A total of 23.1% reported indoor air–related symptoms, 1.8% severe functional impairment due to symptoms, 5.3% moderate, 11.1% mild, and 4.9% reported no impairment. Those with severe functional impairment showed the strongest associations with comorbid diseases, for example, asthma and irritable bowel syndrome, perceived sensitivities to several environmental factors, like chemicals, and likelihood of having symptoms in multiple organs, while those with no or little functional impairment showed weak or even inverse associations. Similar results emerged with severity of indoor air–related symptoms. Conclusions: Individuals with indoor air–related symptoms are a very heterogeneous group. This should be better considered in future research and clinical practice.
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Reactions to everyday environmental factors can range from mild discomfort to general, nonspecific symptoms across various organ systems, and disabling fear-avoidance, impacting daily life, work attendance, and productivity.
“Reactions to everyday environmental factors can range from mild discomfort to general, nonspecific symptoms across various organ systems, such as headaches, fatigue, or respiratory issues, and disabling fear-avoidance, impacting daily life, work attendance, and productivity [2, 11, 13, 14].”
From Work Ability and Functioning Among Individuals with Persistent Indoor Environment-Related Symptoms or Chronic Fatigue: Nine-Month Follow-Up of a Web-Based Randomized Controlled Trial. (2026) · cites this paper as [11]
The Learning Outcomes describe symptoms ranging from irritation to fatigue and headaches, and the Discussion describes symptoms across multiple organ systems attributed to environmental factors. The Results link more severe indoor-air symptoms with avoidance, sick leave, and impaired work ability. The paper does not establish that avoidance is driven by fear or report a productivity measure, so those parts of the claim go beyond its findings. (LLM, conf=0.83)
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Self-citation
- Authors
- Eidstø, E., Selinheimo, S., Lampi, J., Salmela, A., & Pekkanen, J.
- Affiliations
- University of Helsinki (FI)
- Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (FI)
- Venue
- Journal of Occupational & Environmental Medicine
- Published
- 2023-05-23
- Volume
- 65
- Issue
- 9
- Pages
- 717-724
- ISSN
- 1076-2752 (ISSN-L)
- 1536-5948
- PMC
- PMC10487355
- OpenAlex
- W4378348912
- Cited by
- 7
- References
- 46
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 2
- FWCI
- 0.80
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Työväentutkimus Vuosikirja (submittedVersion)
- STM:n Hallinnonalan avoin julkaisuarkisto (Julkari) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Academy of Finland (338679)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis › Indoor Air Quality and Microbial Exposure
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Occupational exposure and asthma
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Psychiatry and Mental health › Psychosomatic Disorders and Their Treatments
- Keywords
- indoor air quality, functional disability, symptom severity, asthma, irritable bowel syndrome, environmental sensitivity, chemosensitivity, comorbid diseases
- MeSH terms
- Asthma, Humans, Surveys and Questionnaires, Prevalence, Logistic Models, Air Pollution, Indoor
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