AIMS: To describe and assess the quality of rehabilitation of @entity5 survivors by occupational physicians and to relate the quality of the process of occupational rehabilitation to the outcome of return to work. METHODS: One hundred occupational physicians of a cohort of @entity5 survivors were interviewed about return to work management. Quality of rehabilitation was assessed by means of four indicators that related to performance in knowledge of @entity5 and treatment, continuity of care, @entity1 complaints, and relations at work. The cohort of @entity1 was prospectively followed for 12 months to assess time to return to work and rate of return to work. @entity1 ' and physicians' satisfaction with care was also assessed. The relation between performance and these outcome measures was studied in a multivariate analysis, taking into account the influence of other work and disease related factors that could potentially predict return to work. RESULTS: For knowledge of @entity5 and treatment, only 3% had optimal performance because occupational physicians did not communicate with treating physicians. For continuity of care, @entity1 complaints, and relations at work, performance was optimal for 55%, 78%, and 60% of the physicians respectively. After adjustment for other prognostic factors, overall physician's performance (hazard ratio (HR) 0.5, 95% CI 0.3 to 0.8) and continuity of care (HR 0.5, 95% CI 0.3 to 0.9) were related to the return to work of @entity1 . Overall optimal performance was also related to a small but significant higher level of satisfaction with care, both for @entity1 and physicians. CONCLUSION: Quality of occupational rehabilitation of @entity5 survivors can be improved substantially, especially with regard to communication between physicians and continuity of care. There is a need for the development of more effective rehabilitation procedures which should be evaluated in a randomised controlled trial.

Return to work of XXXX survivors: a prospective cohort study into the quality of rehabilitation by occupational physicians.

@entity5 :: ('MESH:D009369', 'Disease') :: ['cancer'] @entity1 :: ('9606', 'Species') :: ['patients', 'patient', 'Patients']
@entity5 :: (MESH:D009369,Disease) :: ['cancer']
