Teachers' working time as a risk factor for their mental health - findings from a cross-sectional study at German upper-level secondary schools.

Taking professional experience and teaching subjects into account could in future contribute to a fairer distribution of workload among teachers. This could protect individual teachers from long working hours, ensure sufficient recovery and also reduce the risk of emotional exhaustion. In order to identify teachers whose health is at risk at an early stage, voluntary preventive care offers would be considerably helpful.