University of Leuven, Centre for Environment and Health, Leuven, Belgium.
Idewe, External Service for Prevention and Protection at Work, Leuven, Belgium.
PLoS One. 2019 Jan 11;14(1):e0210359. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0210359. eCollection 2019.
The number of sick-listed employees has increased dramatically worldwide. Therefore, many countries aim to stimulate early and sustainable return to work opportunities to obtain better health outcomes and lower costs for disability pensions. To effectively orientate resources to patients with a high risk of not resuming work spontaneously, it is necessary to screen patients early in their sickness absence process. In this study, we validate "Quickscan", a new instrument to assess return-to-work needs and to predict risks of long-term sick leave.
As part of the Quickscan validation process, we tested and compared the reliability and construct validity of the questionnaire in two different populations. First, we conducted a cross-sectional study in which the screening instrument was sent to sick-listed individuals in healthcare insurance. In a second cross-sectional study, sick-listed workers who consulted the occupational health physician for return-to-work assessment were asked to fill out the questionnaire. We compared both samples for descriptive statistics: frequencies, means and standard deviations. Reliability of the scales was calculated using Cronbach's alpha. Confirmatory factor analysis was performed to evaluate the construct (factorial) validity of the studied scales using software package AMOS 24.
The screening tool was shown to be an instrument with reliable scales (except for the perfectionism and health perception patient scale) in both populations. The construct validity was satisfactory: we found that the hypothesized measurement models with the theoretical factors fitted the data well in both populations. In the first sample, the model improved for scales concerning stressful life events and showed worse fit for person-related factors. Work-related factors and functioning factors both showed similar fit indices across samples. We found small differences in descriptive statistics, which we could explain by the differences in characteristics of both populations.
We can conclude that the instrument has considerable potential to function as a screening tool for disability management and follow-up of sick-leave, provided that some adaptations and validation tests are executed.
全球范围内，因病缺勤的员工人数显著增加。因此，许多国家旨在鼓励尽早并可持续地重返工作岗位，以改善健康结果并降低残疾养老金成本。为了有效地将资源导向那些不太可能自发恢复工作的患者，有必要在员工病假早期对其进行筛查。在这项研究中，我们对一种新的评估工具“Quickscan”进行了验证，该工具可用于评估重返工作的需求并预测长期病假的风险。
作为 Quickscan 验证过程的一部分，我们在两个不同的人群中测试和比较了该问卷的可靠性和结构有效性。首先，我们进行了一项横断面研究，向医疗保险中患病的个人发送了筛查工具。在第二项横断面研究中，向因重返工作评估而咨询职业健康医生的患病员工要求填写问卷。我们对这两个样本进行了描述性统计比较：频率、均值和标准差。使用 Cronbach's alpha 计算了量表的可靠性。使用 AMOS 24 软件包进行验证性因子分析，以评估所研究量表的结构（因子）有效性。
在两个群体中，该筛查工具均显示出具有可靠量表（除完美主义和健康感知患者量表外）的工具。结构有效性令人满意：我们发现，与理论因素相关的假设测量模型与两个群体中的数据拟合良好。在第一个样本中，该模型在涉及压力生活事件的量表上有所改善，而在与人有关的因素上则表现不佳。工作相关因素和功能因素在两个样本中均具有相似的拟合指数。我们发现描述性统计数据存在微小差异，这可以通过两个群体的特征差异来解释。
我们可以得出结论，该工具具有相当大的潜力，可以作为残疾管理和病假随访的筛查工具，前提是要进行一些调整和验证测试。
