Seminar: Prevention strategies for sickness absence: sick individuals or sick populations?

Sickness absence mesmerizes many researchers, given the numerous publications on risk factors for sickness absence. A large variety of risk factors have been identified, including work-related risk factors such as physical work demands and psychosocial work factors (1, 2), unhealthy behaviors such as lack pf physical activity and smoking, and chronic health problems . A logical next step seems to be the development of a prediction model, whereby an individual’s profile on risk factors is converted into a probability on future sickness absence. In the past few years, several prediction models have been developed and validated. It is in intriguing question how to use these models in occupational health practice to identify workers at risk for prolonged sickness absence reliably and to act on this.