Does the threshold for reporting musculoskeletal pain or the probability of attributing work-relatedness vary by socioeconomic position or sex?

Objective: To examine the effect of sex and socioeconomic position
(SEP) on individuals’ perceptions of pain and its work-relatedness.
Methods: We compared self-reported pain in neck–shoulder or arm with
clinical diagnoses and workers’ judgments of work-relatedness with physicians’ assessments based on specific criteria, between sexes and high- and
low-SEP participants in the Oslo Health Study (n = 217). Results: Clinical
diagnoses were more frequent in low-SEP subjects than high-SEP subjects
with pain and generally higher in women than in men. Pain attributed to
work was more frequently assessed as work-related by the physicians in
low-SEP subjects than high-SEP subjects and in men than in women of low
SEP. Conclusions: The threshold for reporting pain seemed higher in lowSEP subjects and among women. Physicians were more likely to agree with
low-SEP workers about work-relatedness.