Association between COVID-19 and Sick Leave for Healthcare Workers in a Large Academic Hospital in Southern Italy: An Observational Study

Raffaele Palladino (), Michelangelo Mercogliano, Claudio Fiorilla, Alessandro Frangiosa, Sabrina Iodice, Stefano Sanduzzi Zamparelli, Emma Montella, Maria Triassi and Alessandro Sanduzzi Zamparelli
Additional contact information
Raffaele Palladino: Department of Public Health, University of Naples “Federico II”, 80125 Naples, Italy
Michelangelo Mercogliano: Department of Public Health, University of Naples “Federico II”, 80125 Naples, Italy
Claudio Fiorilla: Department of Public Health, University of Naples “Federico II”, 80125 Naples, Italy
Alessandro Frangiosa: Department of Public Health, University of Naples “Federico II”, 80125 Naples, Italy
Sabrina Iodice: Department of Public Health, University of Naples “Federico II”, 80125 Naples, Italy
Stefano Sanduzzi Zamparelli: Division of pneumology, A. Cardarelli Hospital, 80131 Naples, Italy
Emma Montella: Department of Public Health, University of Naples “Federico II”, 80125 Naples, Italy
Maria Triassi: Department of Public Health, University of Naples “Federico II”, 80125 Naples, Italy
Alessandro Sanduzzi Zamparelli: Department of Clinical Medicine and Surgery, Section of Respiratory Diseases, University “Federico II”, Azienda Ospedaliera dei Colli-Monaldi Hospital, 80131 Naples, Italy

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 15, 1-8

Abstract: Studies have shown that the pandemic has led to an increase in sick leave periods among healthcare workers (HCWs); however, this might have changed over time considering increase in vaccination coverage and change in COVID-19 variant predominance. Therefore, we conducted an observational study to evaluate whether the type of symptoms and the duration of sick leave period for healthcare workers working in a large university hospital in the South of Italy changed between January 2021 and January 2022; 398 cases of COVID-19 were identified for a total of 382 subjects involved. A total of 191 subjects answered the questionnaire about symptoms; of these, 79 had COVID-19 during the period from March 2020 until February 2022. The results showed a decrease of about 1.2 days in sick leave period for each quarter without finding significant differences in the perception of symptoms. It is possible to hypothesize a contribution from the Omicron variant to the decrease in sick leave period in the last quarter, from vaccination coverage, from optimization of COVID-19 management, and from change in the regulations for the assessment of positivity.

Keywords: COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; sick leave; symptoms; public health; healthcare workers; CAT score (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/15/9670/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/15/9670/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:15:p:9670-:d:881668

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().