ILLNESS ABSENCE AT AN OIL REFINERY AND PETROCHEMICAL PLANT

Results from a prospective illness-absence surveillance of refinery an d petrochemical workers from 1986 through 1994 are presented. Illness absence data for this study were extracted from the morbidity section of the Shell Oil Company's Health Surveillance System, which includes records of all illness absences in excess of 5 days. The majority of e mployees (59%) had no illness absence during the 9-year period studied . The 13% of the population who had three or more absences accounted f or 63% of the total illness absence episodes and 62% of the total work days lost. Frequency rate and duration of absence increased with incr easing age. The increased illness absence was associated with the pres ence of known health risk factors, such as smoking; elevated blood pre ssure, high cholesterol, and obesity. For example, obese women had a t wofold increased illness absence rate compared with nonobese women and the rate for male smokers doubled that of nonsmoking men. These healt h risk factors are also more common among employees with three or more absences than those with fewer or no absences. The goal of this analy sis is to quantify the impact of illness absence to develop disease pr evention strategies to maximize good health in employees and to minimi ze both the frequency and duration of illness absence.