CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 107Workplace Health and Well-beingDigital Mental Health InterventionsMedical Practices and Rehabilitation

Effectiveness of a Blended Web-Based Intervention on Return to Work for Sick-Listed Employees With Common Mental Disorders: Results of a Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial

Open access
Volker, Daniëlle, Zijlstra-Vlasveld, Moniek C, Anema, Johannes R, Beekman, Aartjan TF, Brouwers, Evelien PM, Emons, Wilco HM, van Lomwel, A Gijsbert C, van der Feltz-Cornelis, Christina M·2015·Journal of Medical Internet Research
DOI 10.2196/jmir.4097PMC PMC4468600
Open this paper in CoChat — free accountOpen PDF

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Common mental disorders are strongly associated with long-term sickness absence, which has negative consequences for the individual employee's quality of life and leads to substantial costs for society. It is important to focus on return to work (RTW) during treatment of sick-listed employees with common mental disorders. Factors such as self-efficacy and the intention to resume work despite having symptoms are important in the RTW process. We developed "E-health module embedded in Collaborative Occupational health care" (ECO) as a blended Web-based intervention with 2 parts: an eHealth module (Return@Work) for the employee aimed at changing cognitions of the employee regarding RTW and a decision aid via email supporting the occupational physician with advice regarding treatment and referral options based on monitoring the employee's progress during treatment. OBJECTIVE: This study evaluated the effect of a blended eHealth intervention (ECO) versus care as usual on time to RTW of sick-listed employees with common mental disorders. METHODS: The study was a 2-armed cluster randomized controlled trial. Employees sick-listed between 4 and 26 weeks with common mental disorder symptoms were recruited by their occupational health service or employer. The employees were followed up to 12 months. The primary outcome measures were time to first RTW (partial or full) and time to full RTW. Secondary outcomes were response and remission of the common mental disorder symptoms (self-assessed). RESULTS: A total of 220 employees were included: 131 participants were randomized to the ECO intervention and 89 to care as usual (CAU). The duration until first RTW differed significantly between the groups. The median duration was 77.0 (IQR 29.0-152.3) days in the CAU group and 50.0 (IQR 20.8-99.0) days in the ECO group (hazard ratio [HR] 1.390, 95% CI 1.034-1.870, P=.03). No significant difference was found for duration until full RTW. Treatment response of common mental disorder symptoms did not differ significantly between the groups, but at 9 months after baseline significantly more participants in the ECO group achieved remission than in the CAU group (OR 2.228, 95% CI 1.115-4.453, P=.02). CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study showed that in a group of sick-listed employees with common mental disorders, applying the blended eHealth ECO intervention led to faster first RTW and more remission of common mental disorder symptoms than CAU. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Netherlands Trial Register NTR2108; http://www.trialregister.nl/trialreg/admin/rctview.asp?TC=2108. (Archived by WebCite at http://www.webcitation.org/6YBSnNx3P).

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.2196/jmir.4097

Cites

35 of 35 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

1 of the 36 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

Authors
Volker, D., Zijlstra-Vlasveld, M. C., Anema, J. R., Beekman, A. T., Brouwers, E. P., Emons, W. H., van Lomwel, A. G. C., & van der Feltz-Cornelis, C. M.
Affiliations
  • Tilburg University (NL)
  • Trimbos Institute (NL)
  • Amsterdam Public Health (NL)
Corresponding author
Volker, Daniëlle
ORCID
Venue
Journal of Medical Internet Research
Publisher
JMIR Publications Inc.
Published
2015-05-13
Volume
17
Issue
5
Pages
e116
ISSN
1438-8871 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.2196/jmir.4097
PMC
PMC4468600
OpenAlex
W2160260412
Cited by
107
References
36
Citations by year
2026: 2 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 7 · 2022: 23 · 2021: 9 · 2020: 11 · 2019: 9 · 2018: 11 · 2017: 12 · 2016: 8 · 2015: 1 · 2014: 1
FWCI
19.46
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
cc-by
Locations
  • Journal of Medical Internet Research (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • Research portal (Tilburg University) (publishedVersion, other-oa)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Amsterdam UMC (VU Amsterdam) - Institutional Repository (publishedVersion)
  • VU Research Portal (publishedVersion, other-oa)
  • Pure Amsterdam UMC (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
  • Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • ZonMw
  • Achmea
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Workplace Health and Well-being
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Applied Psychology › Digital Mental Health Interventions
  • Health Sciences › Health Professions › Physical Therapy, Sports Therapy and Rehabilitation › Medical Practices and Rehabilitation
Keywords
return to work, sick-listed employees, common mental disorders, e-health, decision aids, occupational health services, sick leave, remission, self-efficacy, time to return to work, treatment response, employee mental health, collaborative care, work-related musculoskeletal disorders
MeSH terms
Adult, Anxiety Disorders, Mental Disorders, Cooperative Behavior, Depressive Disorder, Female, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Netherlands, Occupational Health Services, Quality of Life, Somatoform Disorders, Therapy, Computer-Assisted, Proportional Hazards Models, Treatment Outcome, Sick Leave, Self Efficacy, Internet, Return to Work

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review