Occupational health advice in NICE guidelines

Sickness absence is a major concern for society costing > pound 13 billion annually. Seeking medical advice is highly recommended in managing sickness absence. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) provides guidance on treating ill-health and promoting public health. NICE has published >500 guidelines. There are three versions of each guideline including full (comprehensive version), NICE (summary of recommendations) and public version.

To evaluate the availability of occupational health advice within relevant NICE guidelines.

Guidelines were selected on the basis of the impact of the disease and its treatment on work ability. All selected guidelines were reviewed for occupational health advice. The findings were categorized in five main domains: impact of the disease on work, impact of work on the disease, rehabilitation, fitness to work and modifications.

Thirty-one published guidelines met the inclusion criteria. Advice on rehabilitation is most frequently referred to with 12 (39%) full, 8 (26%) NICE and 4 (13%) public information guidelines offering advice on this domain. Advice on return to work is the least frequent. The public versions of guidelines rarely offer advice on the studied domains. Occupational health organizations are enlisted as stakeholders in one guideline only. Two occupational health professionals have contributed to the development of two guidelines.

This study suggests that occupational health professionals and organizations should participate more actively in developing NICE guidelines to integrate work-related issues and occupational health advice into NICE guidelines.