Purpose: Return to work(RTW) is a important for work–related injury workers, in that it enables economic income and psychological stability. However, even if they return to work, there is a considerable amount of cases in which employment does not continue due to reasons such as physical disability, aftermath of injury, poor work performance, and conflicts. In the Readiness for change model to return-to-work, proposed by Franche and Krause(2002), five stage in return-to-work process were conceptualized; precontemplation, contemplation, preparation for action, action, and maintenance. The Readiness for Return-To-Work (RRTW) scale based on this model can be used to identify the stage of maintenance after returning to work. This study aims to evaluate the validity of the Korean version of the Readiness of Return-to-work scale for workers who had returned to work, and explore related factors of maintenance stages.
Methods: Participants in this study were injured workers who had an accepted claim from the workers’ compensation system following a work-related musculoskeletal injuries in Korea. They were recruited from patient lists who had returned to work after functional capacity evaluation or work hardening program. A total of 72 injured workers completed survey questionnaires. The RRTW scale for a sample of workers who had returned to work, developed by Franche and collegues(2007), is a self-report measure and consists of 9 items with 2 sub-scales(proactive maintenance, uncertain maintenance). Exploratory factor analysis (EFA)(principal-axis factoring and Oblimin rotation) of RRTW items and logistic regression was used.
Results: The exploratory factor analysis using the original 9 items for the working sample revealed 2-factor model: item 1,2,3,4,5,and 8 for the Uncertain Maintenance dimension, and item 6 and 7 for the Proactive Maintenance dimension. In the total sample, 45.8%(n=33) belonged to the Uncertain Maintenance stage and 54.2%(n=39) to the Proactive Maintenance stage. The t-test results showed that PM group and UM groups differ among groups in areas of depression, fear-avoidance-work, social support, perceived job performance, and workplace satisfaction. Logistic regression analysis showed that the workers who were over 40 years, returned to pre-injury job, and had lower depression were more likely to be in proactive maintenance stage than in uncertain maintenance stage.
Conclusion: Psychometric properties of the Korean version of the RRTW scale for a working sample suggests that the readiness for change model to return-to-work is applicable to Korean workers with work-related injury. Policy attention should be paid to the maintenance phase after return-to-work and stage-specific services should be provided to meet workers’ needs. |
|
Table 1. Mean item scores and factor loadings from Principal-axis factoring analysis of the RRTW (N=72)
Table 2. Socio-demographic, Social, Physical and Psychological Frequency Analysis
Table 3. Predictive Factors of Proactive maintenance stage in RRTW (Logistic Regression)
|
