Clinical trial NCT01039168: Return to Work After a Workplace-oriented Intervention for Patients on Sick Leave Due to Burnout
Official title: Reduction of Person-job Mismatch to Increase Work Capacity, by Education of, and Dialogue Between Involved Parties - Evaluation of an Intervention Program
Study type: INTERVENTIONAL
Overall status: COMPLETED
Phase: NA
Conditions: Professional Burnout
Keywords: Burnout
Sick leave
Intervention study
Prospective study
Work
Lead sponsor: Region Skane
Sponsor class: OTHER
Collaborators: name: Swedish Council for Working Life and Social Research
name: Lund University
name: County Councils of Southern Sweden
First posted: 2009-12-24
Enrollment: 76
Sex: ALL
Maximum age (years): 63
Standard ages: CHILD
ADULT
Accepts healthy volunteers: no
Allocation: NON_RANDOMIZED
Intervention model: PARALLEL
Primary purpose: SUPPORTIVE_CARE

Brief summary: The study aims to evaluate the effect on return to work of a workplace intervention with patients being treated for burnout. The intervention intends to reduce job-person mismatch through patient-supervisor communication.The hypothesis is that the intervention group will show a more favourable outcome than a control group with respect to return to work.

Detailed description: Participants are consecutively recruited in co-operation with regional social insurance offices (RSIOs) in the two southern counties of Sweden. Persons accepting participation are clinically examined and interviewed of the course of events leading up to the burnout and the patient's expectations of changes necessary to facilitate return to work are recorded. The patient´s supervisor is then interviewed at the workplace, responding to the same questions on perceived main causes of the subordinate's sick leave and changes necessary to facilitate return to work. Finally, the core intervention takes place, namely a dialogue being initiated between the patient and the supervisor to find solutions to facilitate return to work. Out of those who do not want to participate, without giving any specific reason for that, a control group is matched by length and degree of sick leave at the time of the intervention.

Eligibility criteria: Inclusion Criteria:

* employment
* sick leave at lest half time 2-6 months due to work related burnout
* previously healthy

Exclusion Criteria:

* other somatic or psychiatric disease explaining the symptoms

Primary outcomes:
measure: Return to work from sick leave
timeFrame: Up to 1,5 years post intervention completion
Secondary outcomes:
measure: Self-rated health measures (only in the intervention group)
timeFrame: Up to 1,5 years post intervention completion
Other outcomes:
Locations:
city: Lund
country: Sweden
facility: Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Lund University Hospital
Study officials:
affiliation: Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Lund University Hospital and Lund University
name: Björn Karlson, PhD
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
References:
citation: Karlson B, Jonsson P, Palsson B, Abjornsson G, Malmberg B, Larsson B, Osterberg K. Return to work after a workplace-oriented intervention for patients on sick-leave for burnout--a prospective controlled study. BMC Public Health. 2010 Jun 2;10:301. doi: 10.1186/1471-2458-10-301.