Changes in sick-leave diagnoses over eleven years in a cohort of young adults initially sick-listed due to low back, neck, or shoulder diagnoses.

OBJECTIVE To study future general and diagnoses-specific sickness absence and disability pension among young adults who were initially on long-term sick-leave due to back, neck, or shoulder diagnoses. DESIGN Eleven-year prospective cohort study. SUBJECTS All 213 adults in a Swedish municipality who, in 1985, were in the age range 25-34 years and had begun a spell of sick-leave lasting > or = 28 days with low back, neck, or shoulder diagnoses. METHODS For the time-period 1985-96, data regarding the dates and diagnoses for all periods of sick-leave, and the dates of disability pension, emigration, and death were obtained. Numbers of days of sick-leave and disability pension were analysed separately for each of the 11 years in relation to the number of days at risk for such benefits. RESULTS The cohort members were on sick-leave or disability pension for 25% of all days at risk during the 11 years of follow-up. A large difference in the number of sick-leave days between the 22% of subjects who were later granted disability pension and the others was already apparent during the first 2 years. During the entire period, up to 21% of the sick-leave days for women and 24% for men entailed psychiatric diagnoses. CONCLUSION This cohort of young adults, initially off sick for 4 weeks due to back, neck, or shoulder diagnoses, also had a high level of sickness absence in the subsequent 11 years with other diagnoses.