Study shows impact of endometriosis on women’s work ability

Middle-aged women with endometriosis took more sick days and exhibited poor work ability compared with those without , according to a Finnish study.

However, the condition had no association unemployment or early retirement.

“To our knowledge, this is the first general population-level study on the association between endometriosis and work ability, including a life course approach to disability retirement," Henna-Riikka Rossi, of the department of obstetrics and gynecology and the PEDEGO research unit at the University of Oulu, and colleagues wrote.

Rossi and colleagues examined how the presence of endometriosis impacts work ability and sick leave in women. The population-based study identified 348 women with endometriosis and 3,487 without who in the Care Register for Health Care. The researchers acquired questionnaire data from the participants at age 46 using the Work Ability Index Score. The Work Ability Index Score involves a self-rating of participants’ work ability from a scale of 0 to 10 with scores in the 0 to 7 range classified as poor work ability. Subsequently, they determined unemployment status and disability days using the Social Insurance Institution of Finland and the Finish Center for Pension registers. Rossi and colleagues collected data on first-ever granted pensions and diagnoses until participants reached age 52.

The mean age of women at the time of their endometriosis diagnosis was 31.6 years. Women with endometriosis were found to have more widespread pain and used contraception more often. Neither employment status nor risk of early retirement was impacted by a diagnosis. Rossi and colleagues found endometriosis with poor work ability in the unadjusted model. However, the final multivariate analysis revealed an association at age 46 (OR 1.62 95% CI 1.06-2.47). During a 2-year follow-up, women with endometriosis had an average of 10 more disability days (55.5 vs 45.5 days; P = .03) and more often reported over 10 days of sickness absenteeism during the previous year (33.5% vs 25.4%; P = .001) compared with women without endometriosis.

“This unique general population-based register-linkage study supports and expands earlier evidence on endometriosis being associated with poorer work ability and sickness absenteeism, even at a late fertile age,” Rossi and colleagues wrote. “On the other hand, we found no association between endometriosis and unemployment between the ages of 46 and 48 years or with lifelong emergence of disability retirement up to age 52.”