Health related quality of life among seamen-focus on Lithuanian seamen

Abstract: Seamen are an exceptional category of people, because they spend most part of their lives being at sea. They are affected by environmental risk factors in everyday activities. The total majority of seamen lives and works in conditions that are extremely harmful to their health. The factors that affect them are: vibration, noise, electromagnetic field, long term stress, the changes in time and climatic zones, irregular sexual intercourse, etc. It has a great negative influence on their health condition and their lives. The thesis consists of two studies, where the first is an integrative literature review of scientific articles with the aim to describe HRQOL among seamen. The conclusion of the integrative review is that there haven’t been found any studies about HRQOL among seamen, but there are some scientific studies about occupation-related health problems among seamen, fishermen and seafarers. It develops a better understanding of environmental, working and living conditions and their effects on the seamen‘s health and HRQOL. It can be stated that the system of health promotion which can possitively affect HRQOL among seamen is not effective in a lot of countries (especially post soviet countries). The second study is an empirical part where 500 Lithuanian seamen volunteer to be tested using WHOQOL-BRIEF questionnaire. The results have showed that the QOL among Lithuanian seamen is poor especially among older seamen and those who work as engineer ship staff, auxiliary and deck service members. In order to improve their QOL, it’s necessary to combine the efforts of government institutions, medical staff and maritime organizations.