Self-reported sick leave following a brief preventive intervention on work-related stress: a randomised controlled trial in primary health care

OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the effectiveness of a brief intervention about early identification of work-related stress combined with feedback at consultation with a general practitioner (GP) on the number of self-reported sick leave days. DESIGN: Randomised controlled trial. Prospective analyses of self-reported sick leave data collected between November 2015 and January 2017. SETTING: Seven primary healthcare centres in western Sweden. PARTICIPANTS: The study included 271 employed, non-sick-listed patients aged 18–64 years seeking care for mental and/or physical health complaints. Of these, 132 patients were allocated to intervention and 139 patients to control. INTERVENTIONS: The intervention group received a brief intervention about work-related stress, including training for GPs, screening of patients’ work-related stress, feedback to patients on screening results and discussion of measures at GP consultation. The control group received treatment as usual. OUTCOME MEASURES: The number of self-reported gross sick leave days and the number of self-reported net sick leave days, thereby also considering part-time sick leave. RESULTS: At 6 months’ follow-up, 220/271 (81%) participants were assessed, while at 12 months’ follow-up, 241/271 (89%) participants were assessed. At 6-month follow-up, 59/105 (56%) in the intervention group and 61/115 (53%) in the control group reported no sick leave. At 12-month follow-up, the corresponding numbers were 61/119 (51%) and 57/122 (47%), respectively. There were no statistically significant differences between the intervention group and the control group in the median number of self-reported gross sick leave days and the median number of self-reported net sick leave days. CONCLUSIONS: The brief intervention showed no effect on the numbers of self-reported sick leave days for patients seeking care at the primary healthcare centres. Other actions and new types of interventions need to be explored to address patients’ perceiving of ill health due to work-related stress. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: NCT02480855.