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Background

Globally, 313 million missed at least four days of work in 2010 due to a work-related injury. Extended periods of work absence are costly and associated with poor health outcomes. Interventions that include return-to-work (RTW) Coordinators improve RTW outcomes, though they have often been investigated as part of a larger intervention package. We investigated whether Coordinator impact varies based on the stressfulness of interactions and whether it goes above and beyond functional aspects of their role and other workplace factors.

Methods

A prospective cohort study of 632 workers in Victoria, Australia with more than ten days of compensation due to work-related injury. Participants rated the stressfulness of their Coordinator interactions, dichotomised into good and poor, and said whether they had a RTW plan. RTW plans are a functional responsibility of Coordinators. We analysed responses at …