Long sick leaves may signal early death risk: study

People who take extended sick leave from work may be at a higher risk of dying early, a finding that could help doctors identify life-threatening problems sooner.

Employees who took medically certified sick leaves for more than seven days at least once in a three-year period had a mortality 1.7 times greater than those who didn't take such leaves, researchers reported in Friday's issue of the British Medical Journal.

For the study, Jenny Head, an epidemiologist at University College London, and her colleagues reviewed sick leave records for nearly 6,500 British civil servants aged 35 to 55, between 1985 and 1988. Mortality was compared up until 2004.

"Data on sickness absence diagnoses may provide useful information to identify groups with increased health risk and a need for targeted interventions," the study's authors concluded.

There appeared to be a relationship between long periods of sick leave and increased risk of premature death not only for serious medical conditions, but also common respiratory infections like the flu, the researchers found.

Those who missed work because of heart disease, stroke or related conditions had more than four times the risk of death compared with those without long absences, the team reported.

Tool for GPs

The link was weaker among those who missed work for infectious diseases, respiratory infections and injuries, but they also showed a 1.5 to 1.7 times risk of death.

People who were absent because of psychiatric illnesses were nearly twice as likely to dieprematurely, and they also showed a 2.5-fold increase in cancer-related deaths. The researchers did not look for possible reasons, but previous research suggests those who are depressed may be less likely to seek treatment.

The one type of illness that was not linked to an increased risk of premature death was musculoskeletal conditions, such as back pain or arthritis.

The study's authors accounted for age, body mass index, employment class, and hypertension, but other unknown health differences could exist between people who take extended sick leaves and those who don't.

In an editorial accompanying the study, Johannes Anema and Allard van der Beek of the VU University Medical Centre in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, agreed that diagnostic information from sick leaves could provide general practitioners with a useful tool to identify workers at increased risk of serious illness or death, and work-related physical or mental health problems like stress.