LOWER LABOR ABSENTEEISM OF POSTMENOPAUSAL WOMEN RECEIVING HORMONE REPLACEMENT THERAPY

Absenteeism affects efficiency and costs of health care. Most of healt h workers are middle age women, whose climacteric symptoms may reduce their work capacity. We studied absenteeism rates due to medical cause s in 444 women of 40 years old or more, working at a public hospital i n Santiago during 1992. Fifty-eight percent were postmenopausal and 34 .8% of these were receiving hormone replacement therapy. Global absent eeism rate was 17.1 days/year. These figures were 14.8 days/year for p remenopausal and 17.8 days/year for postmenopausal women (NS). Among t he latter, those women receiving hormone replacement therapy had a sig nificantly lower absenteeism rate (9.4 days/year compared to 20.4 days /year among those not receiving hormones). Osteoarticular diseases wer e responsible for 44.3% and psychiatric diseases for 18.1% of sick lea ves. No differences in absenteeism were observed between different pro fessional levels. We conclude that hormone replacement therapy is asso ciated with a better working capacity in postmenopausal women.