Policy on professional support in return-to-work: Occupational health professionals' experiences in a Canadian setting.
BACKGROUND
In Canada and other countries, sickness-based absences among workers is an economic and sociological problem. Return-to-work (RTW) policy developed by both employer and worker' representatives (that is, bipartite policy) is preferred to tackle this problem.


OBJECTIVE
The intent was to examine how this bipartite agreed-upon RTW policy works from the perspective of occupational health professionals (those who deliver RTW services to workers with temporary or permanent disabilities) in a public healthcare organization in Canada.


METHODS
In-depth interviews were held with 9 occupational health professionals and transcribed verbatim. A qualitative, social constructivist, analysis was completed.


RESULTS
The occupational health professionals experienced four main problems: 1) timing and content of physicians' medical advice cannot be trusted as a basis for RTW plans; 2) legal status of the plans and thus needing workers' consent and managers' approval can create tension, conflict and delays; 3) limited input and thus little fruitful inference in transdisciplinary meetings at the workplace; and yet 4) the professionals can be called to account for plans.


CONCLUSIONS
Bipartite representation in developing RTW policy does not entirely delete bottlenecks in executing the policy. Occupational health professionals should be offered more influence and their professionalism needs to be enhanced.
['Maiwald|Karin|K|', 'Meershoek|Agnes|A|', 'de Rijk|Angelique|A|', 'Nijhuis|Frans J N|FJ|']
D000328:Adult D001955:British Columbia D034462:Dissent and Disputes D005260:Female D019981:Health Care Sector D006801:Humans D007407:Interviews as Topic D008297:Male D008875:Middle Aged D016272:Occupational Health D016134:Organizational Policy D010559:Personnel Management D036301:Qualitative Research D062707:Return to Work D018582:Sick Leave D013997:Time Factors D014938:Work Capacity Evaluation D017132:Workplace
Sickness absence discretionary space implementation professionals’ perspective return-to-work policy