Improving subjective health and reducing absenteeism in a natural work life-intervention.
A natural one-year work-life intervention to improve occupational health and reduce absenteeism was designed as a field experiment. The intervention allowed the employees in the health care sector of a municipality to take up to five days of self-administered sick leave with full financial compensation up to four times a year. 165 employees in the intervention group and 100 employees in the control group filled out a questionnaire before and after the intervention. The result showed no evidence of misuse of this sick-leave option and some positive subjective health effects were found among those who used the option. Slight improvements were found in musculoskeletal problems and for cold/influenza. There were no effects on overall absenteeism. The question of the impact of local cultures on interventions to improve occupational health is also discussed.
Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Department of Psychology, Trondheim, Norway. per.saksvik@svt.ntnu.no
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D000041:Absenteeism; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001294:Attitude to Health; D005260:Female; D006293:Health Promotion; D006801:Humans; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009664:Norway; D009786:Occupational Health Services; D016017:Odds Ratio; D018582:Sick Leave