title: Trajectory analyses of sickness absence among industrial and municipal employees.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Compared with the public sector, the private sector is more susceptible to changes in the economic environment and associated threats of downsizing, outsourcing and transfers of production. This might be assumed to be associated with more restrictive sickness absence practices.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To investigate whether this difference is reflected in higher sickness absence rates in the public sector and to explore the potential of trajectory analysis in researching such absences.
  
  
  METHODS
  The sample consisted of industrial and municipal employees. Latent groups of differential sickness absence during a 6-year study period were searched with a two-response trajectory analysis that jointly captured the spells and the days. Multinomial logistic regressions were used to assess associations of the labour market sector with the set of trajectories obtained.
  
  
  RESULTS
  There were 2207 industrial and 3477 municipal employees in the study group. The analysis assigned the employees to three trajectory groups, the 'low-level', 'middle-range' and 'high-range' groups. The relative risk ratios for the middle-range and the high-range trajectories of public sector employees were not higher after controlling for age, gender and occupational.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In this study, the labour market sector was not a major independent determinant of sickness absence practices. Trajectory analysis can be recommended as a way to determine differential absence practices. The trajectory approach might help occupational health services to identify more accurately the employees who need support to maintain their work ability.
authors: School of Health Sciences, University of Tampere, 33014 University of Tampere, Finland.
authors: P
authors: P
authors: Virtanen
authors: School of Health Sciences, University of Tampere, 33014 University of Tampere, Finland.
authors: A
authors: A
authors: Siukola
authors: School of Social Sciences and Humanities, University of Tampere, 33014 University of Tampere, Finland.
authors: L
authors: L
authors: Lipiäinen
authors: School of Health Sciences, University of Tampere, 33014 University of Tampere, Finland.
authors: V
authors: V
authors: Liukkonen
authors: Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, 20520 Turku, Finland.
authors: J
authors: J
authors: Pentti
authors: Department of Public Health, University of Turku, 20014 University of Turku, Finland.
authors: J
authors: J
authors: Vahtera
mesh_terms: D000041:Absenteeism; D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006077:Government Agencies; D006801:Humans; D007221:Industry; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D017150:Public Sector; D062707:Return to Work / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D018582:Sick Leave / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors
keywords: Finland; register study; trajectory analysis.