Table 4.
Perceived cause of chronic pain in total sample and by PSP category.a
| Perceived cause, % (n)b,c | Total sample | Municipal/provincial police1 | RCMP2 | Corrections workers3 | Firefighters4 | Paramedics5 | Call center operators/dispatchers6 | Chi-square | Significant difference between PSP categories |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Injury related to active duty | 40.2 (818) | 39.6 (191) | 54.4 (306) | 24.5 (78) | 29.2 (83) | 50.5 (150) | 11.0 (10) | 139.110*** | 1 < 2, 5 |
| 3 < 1, 2, 5 | |||||||||
| 4 < 1, 2, 5 | |||||||||
| 6 < 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 | |||||||||
| Injury related to work other than active duty | 9.6 (195) | 10.2 (49) | 7.3 (41) | 11.6 (37) | 11.6 (33) | 9.4 (28) | 7.7 (7) | 6.918 (NS) | 2 < 3, 4 |
| Injury not related to work | 16.2 (329) | 18.9 (91) | 8.5 (48) | 20.8 (66) | 19.4 (55) | 14.8 (44) | 27.5 (25) | 42.937*** | 2 < 1, 3, 4, 5, 6 |
| 5 < 6 | |||||||||
| Non-injury-related disease (e.g., osteoarthritis) | 11.2 (228) | 10.0 (48) | 7.8 (44) | 14.8 (47) | 11.3 (32) | 12.1 (36) | 23.1 (21) | 24.484*** | 1 < 3, 6 |
| 2 < 3, 5, 6 | |||||||||
| 4 < 6 | |||||||||
| 5 < 6 |
aPSP indicates public safety personnel; RCMP, Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
bOptions for perceived cause of pain are nonmutually exclusive.
cOnly calculated for respondents who reported experiencing any chronic pain, more days than not, that lasted longer than 3 months.
Different numbered superscripts indicate that public safety personnel categories differ from one another at 0.05 only. NS = no significant differences between PSP categories. Differences across categories were tested using logistic regression models for prevalence estimates.
*P ≤ .05; **P ≤ .01; ***P ≤ .001.