Job Performance Deficits Due to Depression

Abstract

Objective-This study assessed the relationship between depression severity and job performance among employed primary care patients.Method-In a 2001-2004 longitudinal observational study of depression's affect on work productivity, 286 patients with DSM-IV major depressive disorder and/or dysthymia were compared to 93 individuals with rheumatoid arthritis, a condition associated with work disability, and 193 depression-free healthy control subjects. Participants were employed at least 15 hours per week, did not plan to stop working, and had no major medical co-morbidities. Measures at baseline, six, 12, and 18 months included the Work Limitations Questionnaire for work outcomes, and the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 for depression.Results-At baseline and each follow-up, the depression group had significantly greater deficits in managing mental-interpersonal, time, and output tasks, as measured by the Work Limitations Questionnaire: The rheumatoid arthritis group's deficits in managing physical job demands surpassed those of either the depression or comparison groups. Improvements in job performance were predicted by symptom severity. However, the job performance of even the "clinically improved" subset of depressed patients remained consistently worse than the control groups.Conclusions-Multiple dimensions of job performance are impaired by depression. This impact persisted after symptoms have improved. Efforts to reduce work-impairment secondary to depression are needed.Research in community-based and primary care populations documents that depression has an adverse affect on employment, resulting in job loss, absenteeism, and "presenteeism" (reduced at-work job performance and productivity) (1-18) and generally an estimated national productivity cost of $44-$51 billion in U.S. dollars annually (19,20). Despite these large human and economic costs, research on the work impact of depression is a topic in a nascent stage. Most available studies have included work outcomes as secondary endpoints, using samples chosen without regard to employment characteristics (e.g., baseline employment status) and omitting appropriate comparison groups. NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author Manuscript before 2000 frequently measured work outcomes using role disability scales not specifically addressing paid employment (21). Generally, the results of such treatment suggest that treatment can reduce the disorder's adverse work impact and that functioning improves relatively soon after treatment is initiated (9, 13). Furthermore, high-quality depression detection and treatment has been shown to be superior to usual care, thus, increasing the number of days employed (9,10,12,13,17). However, no study has used nondepressed comparison groups to judge the impact of depression on work performance. This prospective study builds on prior research by considering job performance as its primary endpoint, including two employed comparison groups. Specifically, we 1) enrolled individuals who were working at b...

Adjuvant occupational therapy improves long-term depression recovery and return-to-work in good health in sick-listed employees with major depression: results of a randomised controlled trial

“…One potential explanation may be that due to the high variability in the duration until partial/full RTW, our power was insufficient to detect significant differences between treatment groups. Second, as previous studies have indicated that functional improvement lags behind symptom reduction,32 it is possible that our follow-up period of 18 months was too short for measuring whether additional effects in depression recovery lead to further improvement in work outcomes after the 18-month follow-up. Finally, an important factor that may have contributed to the discrepancy in study findings is the rapid societal changes that have occurred in The Netherlands since our previous study.…”

An Instrumental Variable Probit (IVP) analysis on depressed mood in Korea: the impact of gender differences and other socio-economic factors

“…In addition to human costs, economic costs have to be taken into account too: people lose 5.6 hours of productive work every week when they are depressed (5): it has been estimated how half of the loss of work productivity is due to absenteeism and short-term disability (6,7). People with symptoms of depression are 2.17 times more likely to take sick days (8) and, when they are at work, their productivity is impaired, depending on how severe the depression is. Workplace costs of depression have been estimated being over $34 billion per year (9); as the costs of absenteeism were directly related to actually taking antidepressant medications (10), those people who took the prescribed medication had a 20% lower cost of absenteeism.…”

Employees with mental illness – Possibilities and barriers in professional activity

“…Z innej strony zaobserwowano, że nawet niewielkie nasilenie objawów negatywnie wpływa na produktywność pracowników [43].…”