Bus Drivers experience high levels of work stress particularly when driving in crowded urban areas. The Center for Social Epidemiology has been working for the past 6 years with the City of Los Angeles Department of Transportation and the bus driver union SMART as well as the SMART-MTA-Trust Fund.
This past year we worked with 400 LA Bus drivers to assess work stressors and their impact on driver health. Bus drivers have the highest prevalence (# of cases) of hypertension of any occupation in the world. An analysis of our findings identifying the various work stressors experienced by drivers contributing to high blood pressure is underway.