[Measuring levels of professionally-related stress in taxi drivers in Fes, Morocco].

Professional stress is a harmful physical and emotional reaction that can occur when tension exists between the requirements imposed on a person and the level of control that person may, or may not, have on the fulfillment of these requirements (essentially tension between what one is expected to achieve and what one can realistically achieve). At present, traffic accidents are considered to be a major social problem in Morocco. The authors aim to describe stress levels in taxi drivers and to study potential associated factors, in particular the risk of having an accident while driving. A questionnaire was administered in a cross sectional survey to a sample of 338 taxi drivers working in the city of Fes, Morocco. Stress was evaluated by using a standardized scale developed by the French National Institute of Research and Safety (INRS). It allows for the intensity of stress to be quantified according to a set of seven scores. According to the INRS scale, 46.3% of the taxi drivers could be considered as stressed. Moodiness and blood pressure problems were specifically identified as indicators of stress in this population. These results should incite interest in developing prevention measures in order to reduce or eliminate sources of stress at work in order to decrease the number of traffic accidents related to stress, and hence to improve the taxi drivers' working conditions.