TABLE 5.

Health, Health Care, and Absenteeism

Study	Key Findings
Paringer 1983	Health status and age are the principal determinants of work absences; economic variables have little impact on time lost from work. Perceived health status is an important predictor of hours lost when all workers are included in a regression equation. Age is significantly related to the number of work days missed because of an illness; the effect varies by gender and occupation.
Mintz et al. 1992	Functional work impairment is common among workers with depression: 11% are unemployed, and 44% experience on-the-job performance problems (absenteeism, decreased productivity, interpersonal problems). These impairments are highly responsive to treatment, given adequate time.
Yen, Edington, and Witting 1992	Employee health has a significant impact on costs of medical claims and losses due to absenteeism. Most costs of absenteeism are due to illness. Among the health-related measures significantly related to absence were smoking, drug and medication use, blood pressure, and total cholesterol.
Nichol et al. 1995	Vaccination against influenza has substantial health-related and economic benefits for healthy, working adults. Primary study outcomes included upper respiratory illnesses, absenteeism from work because of upper respiratory illnesses, and visits to physicians’ offices for upper respiratory illnesses. During the three-month follow-up period, those who received the vaccine reported 25% fewer episodes of upper respiratory illness than those who received a placebo (105 vs. 140 episodes per 100 subjects); 43% fewer days of sick leave from work due to upper respiratory illness (70 vs. 122 days per 100 subjects); and 44% fewer visits to physicians’ offices for upper respiratory illnesses (31 vs. 55 visits per 100 subjects). The cost savings were estimated to be $46.85 per person vaccinated.
Rizzo, Abbott, and Pashko 1996	The net benefits to employers from having workers take prescription medicines for their chronic illnesses are substantial.
	Assuming average compliance rates were achieved, net benefits to employers in 1987 amounted to $286 per hypertensive employee, $633 per employee with heart disease, $822 per depressed employee, and $1,475 per type II diabetic employee under medication from a physician. These estimated benefits accrue because prescription medications substantially lower absenteeism among chronically ill workers.
Kessler and Frank 1997	Work impairment is one of the adverse consequences of psychiatric disorders. In comparison, the average prevalence of psychiatric work loss days (six days per month per 100 workers) and work cutback days (31 days per month per 100 workers) do not differ significantly across occupations. There is substantial variation across occupations in the prevalence of psychiatric disorders, with an average prevalence of 18.2% for any disorder. The effects of psychiatric disorders on work loss are similar across all occupations, while effects on work cutback are greater among professional workers than those in other occupations.
Vistnes 1997	Most absenteeism is related to illness. For both men and women, health status measures (such as self-reported health status and medical events) more consistently explain absenteeism than do economic factors such as wages.
Rizzo, Abbott, and Berger 1998	Average annual productivity losses from chronic backache per worker between $733 (women) and $1,230 (men), resulted in 1996 in an aggregate annual productivity loss in the United States of $28 billion. These productivity losses are quite large, comparable to direct medical costs for treating this chronic illness.