Table 2.
Baseline characteristics and health status of participants in the study compared to non-participants at six, 12 and 24 month follow up
| Participation at six months | Participation at 12 months | Participation at 24 months | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Variable | Yesa (n = 301) | No (n = 151) | P | Yesa (n = 271) | No (n = 181) | P | Yesa (n = 230) | No (n = 222) | p |
| Age (years), Mean (SD) | 41.2 (16.5) | 36.5 (17.8) | 0.006 | 41.8 (16.9) | 36.5 (16.8) | 0.001 | 42.7 (16.6) | 36.5 (17.1) | <0.001 |
| Marital status, No. (%) | 0.001 | 0.068 | 0.002 | ||||||
| Single | 107 (35.7) | 80 (53.7) | 100 (37.3) | 87 (48.1) | 77 (33.9) | 110 (49.5) | |||
| Married/defacto | 162 (54.0) | 54 (36.2) | 140 (52.2) | 76 (42.0) | 127 (55.9) | 89 (40.1) | |||
| Divorced/widowed | 31 (10.3) | 15 (10.1) | 28 (10.4) | 18 (9.9) | 23 (10.1) | 23 (10.4) | |||
| Occupation skill levelb, No. (%) | 0.029 | 0.180 | 0.023 | ||||||
| Home duties/retired | 22 (7.3) | 17 (11.3) | 22 (8.1) | 17 (9.4) | 19 (8.3) | 20 (9.0) | |||
| Managers/professionals | 71 (23.6) | 27 (17.9) | 66 (24.4) | 32 (17.7) | 60 (26.1) | 38 (17.1) | |||
| Tradespersons | 93 (30.9) | 33 (21.9) | 81 (29.9) | 45 (24.9) | 71 (30.9) | 55 (24.8) | |||
| Intermediate clerical | 43 (14.3) | 21 (13.9) | 35 (12.9) | 29 (16.0) | 27 (11.7) | 37 (16.7) | |||
| Elementary related | 72 (23.9) | 53 (35.1) | 67 (24.7) | 58 (32.0) | 53 (23.0) | 72 (32.4) | |||
| Work status before injury (working), No. (%) | 233 (77.9) | 101 (66.9) | 0.011 | 210 (78.1) | 124 (68.5) | 0.023 | 182 (79.9) | 152 (68.5) | 0.006 |
| Total yearly household incomecNo. (%) | 0.018 | 0.080 | 0.153 | ||||||
| ≤$39,999 | 68 (24.5) | 47 (35.1) | 64 (25.3) | 51 (32.3) | 52 (24.1) | 63 (32.3) | |||
| $40,000-$79,999 | 89 (32.1) | 47 (35.1) | 80 (31.6) | 56 (35.4) | 73 (33.8) | 63 (32.3) | |||
| ≥$80,000 | 120 (43.3) | 40 (29.9) | 109 (43.1) | 51 (32.3) | 91 (42.1) | 69 (35.4) | |||
| Smoking history, No. (%) | <0.001 | 0.020 | 0.008 | ||||||
| Current smoker | 64 (21.3) | 61 (40.7) | 62 (23.0) | 63 (35.0) | 49 (21.4) | 76 (34.4) | |||
| Ex-smoker | 86 (28.7) | 33 (22.0) | 76 (28.1) | 43 (23.9) | 68 (29.7) | 51 (23.1) | |||
| Never smoked | 150 (50.0) | 56 (37.3) | 132 (48.9) | 74 (41.1) | 112 (48.9) | 94 (42.5) | |||
| Medication use (current), No. (%) | 89 (29.7) | 32 (21.2) | 0.055 | 85 (31.5) | 36 (19.9) | 0.006 | 73 (31.9) | 48 (21.6) | 0.014 |
| Recovery expectations for usual activitiesd (days), No. (%) | 0.072 | 0.899 | 0.367 | ||||||
| ≤90 | 184 (64.4) | 83 (59.7) | 155 (60.5) | 112 (66.7) | 131 (60.4) | 136 (65.7) | |||
| 91-180 | 58 (20.4) | 36 (25.9) | 58 (22.7) | 36 (21.4) | 49 (22.6) | 45 (21.7) | |||
| 181-365 | 34 (11.9) | 11 (7.9) | 34 (13.3) | 11 (6.5) | 31 (14.3) | 14 (6.8) | |||
| ≥366 | 9 (3.2) | 9 (6.5) | 9 (3.5) | 9 (5.4) | 6 (2.8) | 12 (5.8) | |||
| Vehicle type, No. (%) | 0.002 | 0.006 | 0.005 | ||||||
| Motor vehicle | 169 (56.1) | 102 (67.5) | 155 (57.2) | 116 (64.1) | 129 (56.1) | 142 (64.0) | |||
| Motorcycle | 120 (39.9) | 37 (24.5) | 107 (39.5) | 50 (27.6) | 94 (40.9) | 63 (28.4) | |||
| Bicycle | 12 (4.0) | 12 (7.9) | 9 (3.3) | 15 (8.3) | 7 (3.0) | 17 (7.7) | |||
aParticipation status ‘yes’ was measured using the information recorded in variables - work status at six, 12 and 24 months and the SF36, Physical Component Score (PCS) at six, 12 and 24 months respectively
** P < 0.01, *P < 0.05, NS not significant
bThe measure for occupation is from the Australian Standard Classification of Occupations (ASCO), Cat. No. 1220.0, Australian Bureau of Statistics 1997. See Table 1, Occupational skill level for all categories
cCategories of income are from the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey Wave 6 Household Questionnaire. Income is before tax (AUD) and excluding number of people in household
dRecovery expectations was based on two measures from a large Canadian study of injured workers with soft tissue injuries by Cole et al. (2002) due to the lack of validated measures