Mattila-Holappa, P;
Kausto, J;
Aalto, V;
Kaila-Kangas, L;
Kivimaki, M;
Oksanen, T;
Ervasti, J;
(2021)
Alternative duty work as workplace-initiated procedure to reduce sickness absence.
BMC Public Health
, 21
(1)
, Article 1154. 10.1186/s12889-021-11181-1.
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Abstract
Purpose: Alternative duty work is a procedure that enables an employee with a short-term disability to perform modified duties as an alternative to sickness absence. We examined whether the implementation of an alternative duty policy was associated with reduced sickness absence in the Finnish public sector. Methods: Two city administrations (A and D) that implemented an alternative duty work policy to their employees (n = 5341 and n = 7538) served as our intervention cities, and two city administrations (B and C) that did not implement the policy represented the reference cities (n = 6976 and n = 6720). The outcomes were the number of annual days, all episodes, and short-term (< 10 days) episodes during the 2 years before versus the 2 years after the intervention year. We applied repeated measures negative binomial regression analyses, using the generalized estimating equations method and the difference-in-difference analysis to compare the intervention and control cities (adjusted for sex, age, type of job contract, occupational class). Results: During the five-year study period, the number of sickness absence days and episodes increased in both the intervention and control cities. Covariate-adjusted analysis of relative risk showed that the overall increase in postversus pre-intervention sickness absence days was smaller in intervention City A, RR = 1.14 (95% CI = 1.09–1.21) than in control cities B and C, RR = 1.19 (95% CI =1.14–1.24), group × time interaction p < 0.02. In intervention City D, we found a corresponding result regarding all sickness absence episodes and short-term sickness absence episodes but not days. Conclusions: This follow-up suggests that implementing an alternative duty work policy may marginally decrease employees’ sickness absences.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Alternative duty work as workplace-initiated procedure to reduce sickness absence |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1186/s12889-021-11181-1 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-11181-1 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. |
| Keywords: | Science & Technology, Life Sciences & Biomedicine, Public, Environmental & Occupational Health, Sickness absence, Work disability, Alternative duty work, Work modification, FOLLOW-UP, RETURN, HEALTH, INTERVENTIONS, LEAVE, PARTICIPATION, RETIREMENT, DISORDERS, EMPLOYEES, EPISODES |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Institute of Epidemiology and Health UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Institute of Epidemiology and Health > Epidemiology and Public Health |
| URI: | https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10131508 |
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