Marjan Vidmar - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Marjan Vidmar

Injury Prevention, Oct 1, 2004

The author has granted a nonexclusive licence allowing the National Library of Canada to reproduc... more The author has granted a nonexclusive licence allowing the National Library of Canada to reproduce, loan, distnite or sell copies of this thesis in rnicroform, paper or electronic formats. L'auteur a accordé une licence non exclusive permettant à la Bibliothèque nationale du Canada de reproduire, prêter, distri'buer ou vendre des copies de cette thèse sous la fonne de microfiche/film, de reproduction sur papier ou sur format électronique. The author retains ownership of the L'auteur conserve la propriété du copyright in this thesis. Neither the droit d'auteur qui protège cette thèse. thesis nor substantial extracts fiorn it Ni la thèse ni des extraits substantiels may be printed or othenvise de celle-ci ne doivent être imprimés reproduced without the author's ou autrement reproduits sans son permission. autorisation.

Psychological Injury and Law, 2009

... Renée-Louise Franche & Colette N. Severin & Hyunmi Lee & Sheilah Hogg-Johnson &am... more ... Renée-Louise Franche & Colette N. Severin & Hyunmi Lee & Sheilah Hogg-Johnson & C. Gail Hepburn & Marjan Vidmar & Ellen MacEachen ... It has been theorized that workers will pay greater attention to fairness during times of uncertainty (van den Bos and Lind 2002). ...

Radiotherapy and Oncology, 2004

Twenty-five patients with osteolytic metastases had computed tomography (CT) scans before and 3 m... more Twenty-five patients with osteolytic metastases had computed tomography (CT) scans before and 3 months after palliative radiotherapy.

Occupational and Environmental Medicine, 2007

Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 2004

To describe those factors, from the host of initial measures in ambulatory, independent older men... more To describe those factors, from the host of initial measures in ambulatory, independent older men and women, that were determinants of becoming dependent over an 8-year follow-up. DESIGN: Initial measures in a cohort of independent older adults were used in logistic regression to describe the determinants of becoming dependent at the 8-year follow-up. SETTING: London, Ontario. PARTICIPANTS: Three hundred seventy-three men and women aged 55 to 86. MEASUREMENTS: Initial variables included body size, presence of chronic disease, maximal oxygen uptake (VO 2max), strength, flexibility, walking pace, and leisure time physical activity. RESULTS: An 8-year follow-up of 297 participants identified 43 as dependent. Logistic regression showed age, presence of disease, and VO 2max (cardiorespiratory fitness) at baseline to have significant odds ratios related to the outcome of becoming dependent. Controlling for other factors, a lower VO 2max increased the odds of dependence by 14% for each mL/kg Á min. CONCLUSION: Lower cardiorespiratory fitness was a significant determinant of becoming dependent in an 8-year follow-up of older adults. Initiatives to encourage physical activity in older adults should emphasize exercise, such as brisk walking, to maintain or improve cardiorespiratory fitness.

European Spine Journal, 2008

Study Design. Cohort study. Objective. To measure the prevalence and incidence of work absenteeis... more Study Design. Cohort study. Objective. To measure the prevalence and incidence of work absenteeism involving neck pain in a cohort of claimants to the Ontario Workplace Safety & Insurance Board (WSIB). Summary of Background Data. According to workers' compensation statistics, neck pain accounts for a small proportion of lost-time claims. However, these statistics may be biased by an underenumeration of claimants with neck disorders. Methods. We studied all lost-time claimants to the Ontario WSIB in 1998 and used 2 methods to enumerate neck pain cases. We report the prevalence and incidence of neck pain using 2 denominators: (1) annual number of lost-time claimants and (2) an estimate of the Ontario working population covered by the WSIB. Results. The estimated percentage of lost-time claimants with neck pain ranged from 2.8% (95% CI 2.5-3.3) using only codes specific for neck pain to 11.3% (95% CI 9.5-13.1) using a weighted estimate of codes capturing neck pain cases. The health care sector had the highest percentage of claims with neck pain. The annual incidence of neck pain among the Ontario working population ranged from 6 per 10,000 full-time equivalents (FTE) (95% CI 5-6) to 23 per 10,000 FTE (95% CI 20-27) depending on the codes used to capture neck pain. Male workers between the ages of 20 and 39 years were the most likely to experience an episode of work absenteeism involving neck pain. Conclusion. Neck pain is a common and burdensome problem for Ontario workers. Our study highlights the importance of properly capturing all neck pain cases when describing its prevalence and incidence.

Cancer, 1997

The efficacy of breast carcinoma screening should be enhanced if false-negative mammography were ... more The efficacy of breast carcinoma screening should be enhanced if false-negative mammography were reduced. Prospectively collected data from the Canadian National Breast Screening Study were used to examine whether menstrual cycle phase was associated with false-negative outcomes for mammographic screening. Of 8887 women ages 40-44 years at the onset of screening, randomized to receive annual mammography and clinical breast examination, reporting menstruation no more than 28 days prior to their screening examination, and with a valid radiologic report, 1898 had never used oral contraceptives or replacement estrogen with or without progesterone. The remainder were past (6573) and current (416) estrogen users. Similar selection criteria were applied at subsequent screens. The distribution of false-negative and false-positive mammography in relation to true-negative and true-positive mammography was examined with respect to the follicular (Days 1 to 14) and luteal (Days 15-28) menstrual phases. Comparing luteal with follicular mammograms in 6989 patients who ever used estrogen, the unadjusted odds ratio (2-sided P-values) for false-negatives versus true-negatives was 2.16 (0.05) and the adjusted odds ratio was 1.47 (0.05). In 1898 never-users, parallel odds ratios for luteal false-negatives were 0.55 (1.0) and 0.74 (1.0), respectively. These results suggest that menstruating women who have used hormones may have an increased risk of false-negative results for screening mammograms performed in the luteal phase of the menstrual cycle. An increased risk of false-negative mammography might adversely affect screening efficacy. The impact of menstrual phase on mammographic interpretation, especially for women who ever used hormones, requires further investigation.

American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 2006

The purpose of the study was to describe and quantify the impact of work-related musculoskeletal ... more The purpose of the study was to describe and quantify the impact of work-related musculoskeletal disorders on workers' caregiving activities. A cross-sectional study was conducted in which a telephone survey was administered to 187 lost-time workers' compensation claimants from Ontario, of whom 49.2% were women. Forty-eight percent of the injured workers were providing unpaid care prior to the injury. Injured workers providing caregiving reported an average reduction in time spent in caregiving activities of 5.5 hr/week, 8 months post-injury. A Sex X Return-to-work status ANCOVA was conducted with difference in caregiving hours as the dependent variable, and with the following covariates: Mean number of caregiving hours, comorbidities, site of injury, and education. Independent of weekly hours of caregiving, decreases in caregiving hours were significantly higher if the worker was a woman or had not returned to work. Work-related musculoskeletal disorders have a significant impact on workers' time spent in unpaid caregiving activities, an example of the social consequences of occupational injuries. Occupational and caregiving roles are limited by work-related disorders in a parallel fashion.

American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 2006

There is a need to more accurately enumerate workers with musculoskeletal injuries who make lost-... more There is a need to more accurately enumerate workers with musculoskeletal injuries who make lost-time claims to workers compensation boards. The objective of this study is to develop an approach to more accurately enumerate these workers. Lost-time claims to the Ontario Workplace Safety & Insurance Board (WSIB) were reviewed. Using neck pain as an example, nature of injury and part of body codes were identified to classify cases. Claims of a random sample of 434 claimants were reviewed. The proportion of claimants classified as having neck pain was computed. The proportion of claimants classified with soft-tissue injuries to the neck varied from 0.88 for codes including "neck/cervical region," 0.69 for "back region" to 0.05 for those coded as "shoulder/upper arm." Restricting the enumeration of injuries to specific part of body codes can lead to a gross underestimation of the magnitude of soft-tissue disorders in epidemiological studies using workers' compensation data. The proposed approach leads to more accurate enumeration.

American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 2006

Studies have used insurer-reported compensable days absent as an outcome measure when studying wo... more Studies have used insurer-reported compensable days absent as an outcome measure when studying work-related injury or illness. Compared to self-reported days absent, insurer data are less expensive to collect. Previous work has identified that insurer-claims data consistently underestimate the duration of days absent when compared to self-report. The objective of this study was to examine the agreement between the number of self-reported days absent from work following a compensable work-related injury and the number of insurer-reported compensation days paid, and to examine factors associated with the magnitude of the discrepancy between the number of self-reported days absent and the number of insurer-reported compensated days paid. One hundred sixty six respondents who experienced a work-related injury were interviewed approximately 200 days post-injury to assess the number of days absent from work. The number of days compensated by the insurer was compared to self-report using descriptive statistics and linear regression. Respondents who had yet to experience a return-to-work (RTW) had the largest median discrepancy followed by respondents with an unsustained RTW and finally sustained RTW. Respondents with upper extremity injuries, lower education, and lower RTW self-efficacy showed greater discrepancy between self-reported and compensated days absent. Among respondents who self-reported fewer days absent than insurer-compensated days absent an inverse relationship between firm size and discrepancy was noted. Researchers should be aware of the discrepancies between self-reported and compensated days absent. Future studies planning to incorporate days absent as an outcome variable should carefully consider what measure would be more appropriate and potentially collect both self-report and administrative data to assess the discrepancy.

Annals of Saudi Medicine, 2008

Abstract: Objectives: To estimate the incidence of compensated claims involving mild traumatic br... more Abstract: Objectives: To estimate the incidence of compensated claims involving mild traumatic brain injury among On-tario workers covered by the Workplace Safety & Insurance Board (WSIB) and to describe the number and duration of days off work related to incident claims using workers compensation administrative data. Methods: We used a population-based, historical cohort of 111,800 injured workers aged 20 or older with a claim to the Ontario Workers ’ Safety and Insurance Board in 1998. We estimated the incidence as the rate of new mild traumatic brain injury in the Ontario working population eligible for compensation by the WSIB. We described the number and duration of disability days using an episodic and cumulative analysis of time on benefits over a two-year period (1997-98) deter-mined from administrative data. Results: The annual incidence was 1.5 (95 % CI: 1.3, 1.7) per 10,000 full-time equivalents. Eighty-seven percent of claim-ants had a single episode of benefits with med...

Spine, 2011

Cohort study. To describe the course of lost-time claims involving neck pain in workers compensat... more Cohort study. To describe the course of lost-time claims involving neck pain in workers compensated by the Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB). The prevalence of neck pain in workers varies from 27.1% to 47.8%. Very little is known about the course of work absenteeism related to neck pain. Our cohort included 5761 injured workers with an incident lost-time claim to the WSIB in 1997 and 1998. Claimants were followed for 2 years. We measured the cumulative time on lost-time benefits using the Kaplan-Meier method and described the number and duration of episodes on benefits. The median cumulative time-on-benefits for the cohort was 13 days (95% CI: 13-14). The cumulative time on benefits was shorter for men than women and for younger than older workers. 14.2% of claimants experienced multiple episodes of work absenteeism during the 2 years after the initial claim. The median time on benefits for claimants with a single episode was 11 days (95% CI: 10-11). The median length of the first episode on benefits was longer for claimants with multiple episodes (19-22 days) compared with those with a single episode (11 days). Age was positively associated with longer time-on-benefits in claimants with a single episode of work absenteeism. Most injured workers who make a workers' compensation claim that involves neck pain do not make a second claim in the subsequent 2 years. However, an important minority (14.2%) experience multiple episodes of work absenteeism and these workers accrue 40.4% of all lost-time days. Recurrent claims involving neck pain represent a significant burden of disability in Ontario.

Acog Clinical Review, 1998

The effect of antenatal phenobarbital therapy on neonatal intracranial hemorrhage in preterm infa... more The effect of antenatal phenobarbital therapy on neonatal intracranial hemorrhage in preterm infants. N Engl J Med 1997;

The Open Occupational Health & Safety Journal, 2010

Objectives: To estimate the incidence of compensated claims involving mild traumatic brain injury... more Objectives: To estimate the incidence of compensated claims involving mild traumatic brain injury among Ontario workers covered by the Workplace Safety & Insurance Board (WSIB) and to describe the number and duration of days off work related to incident claims using workers compensation administrative data. Methods: We used a population-based, historical cohort of 111,800 injured workers aged 20 or older with a claim to the Ontario Workers' Safety and Insurance Board in 1998. We estimated the incidence as the rate of new mild traumatic brain injury in the Ontario working population eligible for compensation by the WSIB. We described the number and duration of disability days using an episodic and cumulative analysis of time on benefits over a two-year period (1997-98) determined from administrative data. Results: The annual incidence was 1.5 (95% CI: 1.3, 1.7) per 10,000 full-time equivalents. Eighty-seven percent of claimants had a single episode of benefits with median duration of 11 days (95% CI: 10, 12). Fifty percent were off benefits after 17 days and 75% by 72 days. Conclusions: Mild traumatic brain injury is disabling in the working population. Most work disability is short-term, but a small proportion of claimants become chronically disabled and unable to work.

Spine, 2011

Cohort study. To describe the course of lost-time claims involving neck pain in workers compensat... more Cohort study. To describe the course of lost-time claims involving neck pain in workers compensated by the Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB). The prevalence of neck pain in workers varies from 27.1% to 47.8%. Very little is known about the course of work absenteeism related to neck pain. Our cohort included 5761 injured workers with an incident lost-time claim to the WSIB in 1997 and 1998. Claimants were followed for 2 years. We measured the cumulative time on lost-time benefits using the Kaplan-Meier method and described the number and duration of episodes on benefits. The median cumulative time-on-benefits for the cohort was 13 days (95% CI: 13-14). The cumulative time on benefits was shorter for men than women and for younger than older workers. 14.2% of claimants experienced multiple episodes of work absenteeism during the 2 years after the initial claim. The median time on benefits for claimants with a single episode was 11 days (95% CI: 10-11). The median length of the first episode on benefits was longer for claimants with multiple episodes (19-22 days) compared with those with a single episode (11 days). Age was positively associated with longer time-on-benefits in claimants with a single episode of work absenteeism. Most injured workers who make a workers' compensation claim that involves neck pain do not make a second claim in the subsequent 2 years. However, an important minority (14.2%) experience multiple episodes of work absenteeism and these workers accrue 40.4% of all lost-time days. Recurrent claims involving neck pain represent a significant burden of disability in Ontario.

Injury Prevention, Oct 1, 2004

The author has granted a nonexclusive licence allowing the National Library of Canada to reproduc... more The author has granted a nonexclusive licence allowing the National Library of Canada to reproduce, loan, distnite or sell copies of this thesis in rnicroform, paper or electronic formats. L'auteur a accordé une licence non exclusive permettant à la Bibliothèque nationale du Canada de reproduire, prêter, distri'buer ou vendre des copies de cette thèse sous la fonne de microfiche/film, de reproduction sur papier ou sur format électronique. The author retains ownership of the L'auteur conserve la propriété du copyright in this thesis. Neither the droit d'auteur qui protège cette thèse. thesis nor substantial extracts fiorn it Ni la thèse ni des extraits substantiels may be printed or othenvise de celle-ci ne doivent être imprimés reproduced without the author's ou autrement reproduits sans son permission. autorisation.

Psychological Injury and Law, 2009

... Renée-Louise Franche & Colette N. Severin & Hyunmi Lee & Sheilah Hogg-Johnson &am... more ... Renée-Louise Franche & Colette N. Severin & Hyunmi Lee & Sheilah Hogg-Johnson & C. Gail Hepburn & Marjan Vidmar & Ellen MacEachen ... It has been theorized that workers will pay greater attention to fairness during times of uncertainty (van den Bos and Lind 2002). ...

Radiotherapy and Oncology, 2004

Twenty-five patients with osteolytic metastases had computed tomography (CT) scans before and 3 m... more Twenty-five patients with osteolytic metastases had computed tomography (CT) scans before and 3 months after palliative radiotherapy.

Occupational and Environmental Medicine, 2007

Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 2004

To describe those factors, from the host of initial measures in ambulatory, independent older men... more To describe those factors, from the host of initial measures in ambulatory, independent older men and women, that were determinants of becoming dependent over an 8-year follow-up. DESIGN: Initial measures in a cohort of independent older adults were used in logistic regression to describe the determinants of becoming dependent at the 8-year follow-up. SETTING: London, Ontario. PARTICIPANTS: Three hundred seventy-three men and women aged 55 to 86. MEASUREMENTS: Initial variables included body size, presence of chronic disease, maximal oxygen uptake (VO 2max), strength, flexibility, walking pace, and leisure time physical activity. RESULTS: An 8-year follow-up of 297 participants identified 43 as dependent. Logistic regression showed age, presence of disease, and VO 2max (cardiorespiratory fitness) at baseline to have significant odds ratios related to the outcome of becoming dependent. Controlling for other factors, a lower VO 2max increased the odds of dependence by 14% for each mL/kg Á min. CONCLUSION: Lower cardiorespiratory fitness was a significant determinant of becoming dependent in an 8-year follow-up of older adults. Initiatives to encourage physical activity in older adults should emphasize exercise, such as brisk walking, to maintain or improve cardiorespiratory fitness.

European Spine Journal, 2008

Study Design. Cohort study. Objective. To measure the prevalence and incidence of work absenteeis... more Study Design. Cohort study. Objective. To measure the prevalence and incidence of work absenteeism involving neck pain in a cohort of claimants to the Ontario Workplace Safety & Insurance Board (WSIB). Summary of Background Data. According to workers' compensation statistics, neck pain accounts for a small proportion of lost-time claims. However, these statistics may be biased by an underenumeration of claimants with neck disorders. Methods. We studied all lost-time claimants to the Ontario WSIB in 1998 and used 2 methods to enumerate neck pain cases. We report the prevalence and incidence of neck pain using 2 denominators: (1) annual number of lost-time claimants and (2) an estimate of the Ontario working population covered by the WSIB. Results. The estimated percentage of lost-time claimants with neck pain ranged from 2.8% (95% CI 2.5-3.3) using only codes specific for neck pain to 11.3% (95% CI 9.5-13.1) using a weighted estimate of codes capturing neck pain cases. The health care sector had the highest percentage of claims with neck pain. The annual incidence of neck pain among the Ontario working population ranged from 6 per 10,000 full-time equivalents (FTE) (95% CI 5-6) to 23 per 10,000 FTE (95% CI 20-27) depending on the codes used to capture neck pain. Male workers between the ages of 20 and 39 years were the most likely to experience an episode of work absenteeism involving neck pain. Conclusion. Neck pain is a common and burdensome problem for Ontario workers. Our study highlights the importance of properly capturing all neck pain cases when describing its prevalence and incidence.

Cancer, 1997

The efficacy of breast carcinoma screening should be enhanced if false-negative mammography were ... more The efficacy of breast carcinoma screening should be enhanced if false-negative mammography were reduced. Prospectively collected data from the Canadian National Breast Screening Study were used to examine whether menstrual cycle phase was associated with false-negative outcomes for mammographic screening. Of 8887 women ages 40-44 years at the onset of screening, randomized to receive annual mammography and clinical breast examination, reporting menstruation no more than 28 days prior to their screening examination, and with a valid radiologic report, 1898 had never used oral contraceptives or replacement estrogen with or without progesterone. The remainder were past (6573) and current (416) estrogen users. Similar selection criteria were applied at subsequent screens. The distribution of false-negative and false-positive mammography in relation to true-negative and true-positive mammography was examined with respect to the follicular (Days 1 to 14) and luteal (Days 15-28) menstrual phases. Comparing luteal with follicular mammograms in 6989 patients who ever used estrogen, the unadjusted odds ratio (2-sided P-values) for false-negatives versus true-negatives was 2.16 (0.05) and the adjusted odds ratio was 1.47 (0.05). In 1898 never-users, parallel odds ratios for luteal false-negatives were 0.55 (1.0) and 0.74 (1.0), respectively. These results suggest that menstruating women who have used hormones may have an increased risk of false-negative results for screening mammograms performed in the luteal phase of the menstrual cycle. An increased risk of false-negative mammography might adversely affect screening efficacy. The impact of menstrual phase on mammographic interpretation, especially for women who ever used hormones, requires further investigation.

American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 2006

The purpose of the study was to describe and quantify the impact of work-related musculoskeletal ... more The purpose of the study was to describe and quantify the impact of work-related musculoskeletal disorders on workers' caregiving activities. A cross-sectional study was conducted in which a telephone survey was administered to 187 lost-time workers' compensation claimants from Ontario, of whom 49.2% were women. Forty-eight percent of the injured workers were providing unpaid care prior to the injury. Injured workers providing caregiving reported an average reduction in time spent in caregiving activities of 5.5 hr/week, 8 months post-injury. A Sex X Return-to-work status ANCOVA was conducted with difference in caregiving hours as the dependent variable, and with the following covariates: Mean number of caregiving hours, comorbidities, site of injury, and education. Independent of weekly hours of caregiving, decreases in caregiving hours were significantly higher if the worker was a woman or had not returned to work. Work-related musculoskeletal disorders have a significant impact on workers' time spent in unpaid caregiving activities, an example of the social consequences of occupational injuries. Occupational and caregiving roles are limited by work-related disorders in a parallel fashion.

American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 2006

There is a need to more accurately enumerate workers with musculoskeletal injuries who make lost-... more There is a need to more accurately enumerate workers with musculoskeletal injuries who make lost-time claims to workers compensation boards. The objective of this study is to develop an approach to more accurately enumerate these workers. Lost-time claims to the Ontario Workplace Safety & Insurance Board (WSIB) were reviewed. Using neck pain as an example, nature of injury and part of body codes were identified to classify cases. Claims of a random sample of 434 claimants were reviewed. The proportion of claimants classified as having neck pain was computed. The proportion of claimants classified with soft-tissue injuries to the neck varied from 0.88 for codes including "neck/cervical region," 0.69 for "back region" to 0.05 for those coded as "shoulder/upper arm." Restricting the enumeration of injuries to specific part of body codes can lead to a gross underestimation of the magnitude of soft-tissue disorders in epidemiological studies using workers' compensation data. The proposed approach leads to more accurate enumeration.

American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 2006

Studies have used insurer-reported compensable days absent as an outcome measure when studying wo... more Studies have used insurer-reported compensable days absent as an outcome measure when studying work-related injury or illness. Compared to self-reported days absent, insurer data are less expensive to collect. Previous work has identified that insurer-claims data consistently underestimate the duration of days absent when compared to self-report. The objective of this study was to examine the agreement between the number of self-reported days absent from work following a compensable work-related injury and the number of insurer-reported compensation days paid, and to examine factors associated with the magnitude of the discrepancy between the number of self-reported days absent and the number of insurer-reported compensated days paid. One hundred sixty six respondents who experienced a work-related injury were interviewed approximately 200 days post-injury to assess the number of days absent from work. The number of days compensated by the insurer was compared to self-report using descriptive statistics and linear regression. Respondents who had yet to experience a return-to-work (RTW) had the largest median discrepancy followed by respondents with an unsustained RTW and finally sustained RTW. Respondents with upper extremity injuries, lower education, and lower RTW self-efficacy showed greater discrepancy between self-reported and compensated days absent. Among respondents who self-reported fewer days absent than insurer-compensated days absent an inverse relationship between firm size and discrepancy was noted. Researchers should be aware of the discrepancies between self-reported and compensated days absent. Future studies planning to incorporate days absent as an outcome variable should carefully consider what measure would be more appropriate and potentially collect both self-report and administrative data to assess the discrepancy.

Annals of Saudi Medicine, 2008

Abstract: Objectives: To estimate the incidence of compensated claims involving mild traumatic br... more Abstract: Objectives: To estimate the incidence of compensated claims involving mild traumatic brain injury among On-tario workers covered by the Workplace Safety & Insurance Board (WSIB) and to describe the number and duration of days off work related to incident claims using workers compensation administrative data. Methods: We used a population-based, historical cohort of 111,800 injured workers aged 20 or older with a claim to the Ontario Workers ’ Safety and Insurance Board in 1998. We estimated the incidence as the rate of new mild traumatic brain injury in the Ontario working population eligible for compensation by the WSIB. We described the number and duration of disability days using an episodic and cumulative analysis of time on benefits over a two-year period (1997-98) deter-mined from administrative data. Results: The annual incidence was 1.5 (95 % CI: 1.3, 1.7) per 10,000 full-time equivalents. Eighty-seven percent of claim-ants had a single episode of benefits with med...

Spine, 2011

Cohort study. To describe the course of lost-time claims involving neck pain in workers compensat... more Cohort study. To describe the course of lost-time claims involving neck pain in workers compensated by the Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB). The prevalence of neck pain in workers varies from 27.1% to 47.8%. Very little is known about the course of work absenteeism related to neck pain. Our cohort included 5761 injured workers with an incident lost-time claim to the WSIB in 1997 and 1998. Claimants were followed for 2 years. We measured the cumulative time on lost-time benefits using the Kaplan-Meier method and described the number and duration of episodes on benefits. The median cumulative time-on-benefits for the cohort was 13 days (95% CI: 13-14). The cumulative time on benefits was shorter for men than women and for younger than older workers. 14.2% of claimants experienced multiple episodes of work absenteeism during the 2 years after the initial claim. The median time on benefits for claimants with a single episode was 11 days (95% CI: 10-11). The median length of the first episode on benefits was longer for claimants with multiple episodes (19-22 days) compared with those with a single episode (11 days). Age was positively associated with longer time-on-benefits in claimants with a single episode of work absenteeism. Most injured workers who make a workers' compensation claim that involves neck pain do not make a second claim in the subsequent 2 years. However, an important minority (14.2%) experience multiple episodes of work absenteeism and these workers accrue 40.4% of all lost-time days. Recurrent claims involving neck pain represent a significant burden of disability in Ontario.

Acog Clinical Review, 1998

The effect of antenatal phenobarbital therapy on neonatal intracranial hemorrhage in preterm infa... more The effect of antenatal phenobarbital therapy on neonatal intracranial hemorrhage in preterm infants. N Engl J Med 1997;

The Open Occupational Health & Safety Journal, 2010

Objectives: To estimate the incidence of compensated claims involving mild traumatic brain injury... more Objectives: To estimate the incidence of compensated claims involving mild traumatic brain injury among Ontario workers covered by the Workplace Safety & Insurance Board (WSIB) and to describe the number and duration of days off work related to incident claims using workers compensation administrative data. Methods: We used a population-based, historical cohort of 111,800 injured workers aged 20 or older with a claim to the Ontario Workers' Safety and Insurance Board in 1998. We estimated the incidence as the rate of new mild traumatic brain injury in the Ontario working population eligible for compensation by the WSIB. We described the number and duration of disability days using an episodic and cumulative analysis of time on benefits over a two-year period (1997-98) determined from administrative data. Results: The annual incidence was 1.5 (95% CI: 1.3, 1.7) per 10,000 full-time equivalents. Eighty-seven percent of claimants had a single episode of benefits with median duration of 11 days (95% CI: 10, 12). Fifty percent were off benefits after 17 days and 75% by 72 days. Conclusions: Mild traumatic brain injury is disabling in the working population. Most work disability is short-term, but a small proportion of claimants become chronically disabled and unable to work.

Spine, 2011

Cohort study. To describe the course of lost-time claims involving neck pain in workers compensat... more Cohort study. To describe the course of lost-time claims involving neck pain in workers compensated by the Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB). The prevalence of neck pain in workers varies from 27.1% to 47.8%. Very little is known about the course of work absenteeism related to neck pain. Our cohort included 5761 injured workers with an incident lost-time claim to the WSIB in 1997 and 1998. Claimants were followed for 2 years. We measured the cumulative time on lost-time benefits using the Kaplan-Meier method and described the number and duration of episodes on benefits. The median cumulative time-on-benefits for the cohort was 13 days (95% CI: 13-14). The cumulative time on benefits was shorter for men than women and for younger than older workers. 14.2% of claimants experienced multiple episodes of work absenteeism during the 2 years after the initial claim. The median time on benefits for claimants with a single episode was 11 days (95% CI: 10-11). The median length of the first episode on benefits was longer for claimants with multiple episodes (19-22 days) compared with those with a single episode (11 days). Age was positively associated with longer time-on-benefits in claimants with a single episode of work absenteeism. Most injured workers who make a workers' compensation claim that involves neck pain do not make a second claim in the subsequent 2 years. However, an important minority (14.2%) experience multiple episodes of work absenteeism and these workers accrue 40.4% of all lost-time days. Recurrent claims involving neck pain represent a significant burden of disability in Ontario.