Sickness absence in Troms County. Trends and risk factors

Abstract

This thesis examines the dynamics of the sickness absence in Troms county. High level of sickness absence in Norway causes substantial costs for sick pay scheme and replacement workers likewise significant reduction in productivity. Awareness of the trends of sickness absence and the risk factors which increase the likelihood of sick leave contributes to the establishment of proper policies aimed to reduce it. Until now the measures did not show expected efficiency. My method of analysis is a combination of descriptive statistics and regression analysis performed by using RStudio software (RStudio, 2015). I examined the relationship between variables day of week, month, year, mean temperature, sum of precipitation and wind power, gender, sector, age and profession and the frequency of the registered sick leaves in Troms county for the period 2010-2017. Key findings are: 1) the sickness absence showed pronounced seasonality and steadily growth during the estimated period, 2) weather describing variables did not show significant effect on the frequency of sick leaves, 3) women have more sickness absence than men, 4) municipality sector has the highest sickness absence rate, followed by private and governments sectors, 5) younger population showed significant ongoing increase in sickness absence compared to older population, 6) significant changes in the economy reflecting on GDP cause fluctuations and deviations from the general trend of sickness absence in all sectors, age and profession groups.