Background
Work
disability due to musculoskeletal and mental health disorders
constitutes one of the greatest social and labor market challenges.
There is a need to investigate the long-term impact of interventions
provided to employees.
Objective
To
investigate if a brief work-oriented intervention targeting
musculoskeletal and mental health disorders affected the risk of work
disability.
Methods
A
prospective study using national register data was designed. The
intervention group consisted of all patients (n = 6348) who in the years
2008–2017 participated in a brief intervention at an outpatient clinic
in the secondary health care service. The comparison group (n = 25,354)
consisted of employees sick-listed for musculoskeletal or mental health
disorders in the same years as the intervention group. Cox proportional
hazard regression was used to model the effect of the intervention on
the risk of future disability pension. Overall and subgroup analyses for
gender and diagnoses were conducted for various categories of full-time
equivalent number of days lost to work.
Results
Generally,
there was a pattern of increased risk of disability among patients in
the intervention group if they participated in the intervention in an
early phase of sick leave. This pattern was found in the overall
analysis, for males, females, and patients with musculoskeletal
disorders. Except for patients with only musculoskeletal disorders,
there was a pattern of reduced risk of disability with sick leave of
between three and six months.
Conclusions
Overall,
the intervention did not reduce the risk of disability. However, the
results do indicate that intervention timing may be of significance.
https://doi.org/10.1177/10519815251353214
