The Cost and Impact of Health Conditions on Presenteeism to Employers

Abstract

Employers are becoming concerned with the costs of presenteeism in addition to the healthcare and absenteeism costs that have traditionally been explored. But what is the true impact of health conditions in terms of on-the-job productivity? This article examines the literature to assess the magnitude of presenteeism costs relative to total costs of a variety of health conditions. Searches of MEDLINE, CINAHL and PubMed were conducted in July 2008, with no starting date limitation, using 'presenteeism' or 'work limitations' as keywords. Publications on a variety of health conditions were located and included if they assessed the total healthcare and productivity cost of one or more health conditions. Literature on presenteeism has investigated its link with a large number of health conditions ranging from allergies to irritable bowel syndrome. The cost of presenteeism relative to the total cost varies by condition. In some cases (such as allergies or migraine headaches), the cost of presenteeism is much larger than the direct healthcare cost, while in other cases (such as hypertension or cancer), healthcare is the larger component. Many more studies have examined the impact of pharmaceutical treatment on certain medical conditions and the resulting improvement in on-the-job productivity. Based on the research reviewed here, health conditions are associated with on-the-job productivity losses and presenteeism is a major component of the total employer cost of those conditions, although the exact dollar amount cannot be determined at this time. Interventions, including the appropriate use of pharmaceutical agents, may be helpful in improving the productivity of employees with certain conditions.

Paid Sick Leave as a Means to Reduce Sickness Presenteeism Among Physicians

“…This behavior is unlikely to benefit the physicians, their colleagues, or their patients. Presenteeism has been associated with negative personal outcomes, such as decreased general health (Aronsson et al, 2011;Bergström et al, 2009), depression (Conway et al, 2014), burnout (Miraglia & Johns, 2015;Thun et al, 2014), and future sickness absenteeism (Bergström et al, 2009;Gustafsson & Marklund, 2011;Hansen & Andersen, 2009), and with negative organizational outcomes such as decreased performance and productivity (Dellve et al, 2011;Hemp, 2004;Schultz et al, 2009). Presenteeism has also been identified as a risk factor for committing serious errors and safety violations (Niven & Ciborowska, 2015), and in disease transmission (Widera et al, 2010).…”

Looking for the Possible Association Between Stress, Presenteeism and Absenteeism Among Croatian Nurses: A Cross-Sectional Study

“…As mentioned above, disease is one of the common factors. Workplace factors (perception of the working environment either as a positive or a negative place, daily "must-do tasks", replacement difficulties and tasks that need to be personally covered upon return, management-employee relations, support from peers, job insecurity and culture) and personal reasons (financial reasons, attitudes toward own health, work-life balance and family) often influence the decision of whether to come to work or not (6)(7)(8)(9)(10)(11)(12)(13). Moreover, absenteeism and presenteeism are often inter-related.…”

“…Sickness presenteeism due to acute illness (cold, flu, allergy, etc.) is sometimes more favorable to the employees because they have a choice of whether or not to attend work (8). When it comes to sickness presenteeism due to chronic condition (arthritis, back pain, mental health problems, etc.)…”

“…When it comes to sickness presenteeism due to chronic condition (arthritis, back pain, mental health problems, etc.) employees may need to work despite the impairment (8,28). This type of presenteeism has become a challenging problem in developed countries due to ageing workforce and an increasing number of people with chronic health conditions (29).…”

Health-Related Productivity Loss: NICE to Recognize Soon, Good to Discuss Now

“…Only some instruments are able to translate presenteeism into time loss, and their estimates vary widely, for example, from 2 to 14 h over 2 weeks [11]. Thus, the results from studies using different instruments are not comparable and the exact cost amount cannot be determined at this time [12]. The main challenge of presenteeism measurement is the lack of a gold standard or objective measures to test its criterion validity.…”