Affiliations: Division of Community Medicine, Department of Medicine
and Health Sciences, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden | Personal Injury Prevention, Department of Clinical
Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden
Note: [] Address for correspondence: Elsy Söderberg, Division of
Community Medicine, Department of Medicine and Health Sciences, Linköping
University, S-581 85 Linköping, Sweden. Tel.: +46 706 668218; Fax: +46 13
22 18 65; E-mail: elsy.soderberg@liu.se
Abstract: In Sweden, the activities initiated to promote return to work (RTW)
are performed in parallel by four different public organisations: the health
services, the social services, the employment and the social insurance
authorities. The aim was to gain deeper understanding on the experiences of
professionals involved in cooperative projects aimed at promoting RTW among
unemployed sickness benefit recipients. Qualitative analyses were performed of
transcribed data from interviews of professionals participating in cooperative
projects. First, the analysis identified that the daily collaboration on the
same cases enabled development of good relationships and cooperative
competence, which improved the contact with clients. Second, the cooperative
projects made it possible to include only clients perceived motivated for RTW
measures. Third, the closer and more frequent interaction with clients proved
to be constructive in that it facilitated recognition and mobilisation of
strengths and abilities. Fourth, the differences in rules and regulations
between the social insurance and the unemployment insurance standards were
often perceived to induce problems, for example, on how to assess the work
capacity of clients. The assessments of work capacity represent important and
complex tasks that professionals must perform without having access to either
scientific knowledge or consensus agreement on which to base their
decisions.
Keywords: Sickness absence, unemployed, return to work, cooperative projects, cooperative competence, work capacity
