Using intervention mapping to develop evidence-based toolkits that support workers on long-term sick leave and their managers

Varela-Mato, Veronica; Blake, Holly; Yarker, Joanna; Godfree, Kate; Daly, Guy; Hassard, Juliet; Meyer, Caroline; Kershaw, Charlotte; Marwaha, Steven; Newman, Kristina; Russell, Sean; Thomson, Louise; Munir, Fehmidah

Abstract

Background: Managing long-term sickness absence is challenging in countries where employers and managers have the main responsibility to provide return to work support, particularly for workers with poor mental health. Whilst long-term sick leave and return to work frameworks and guidance exist for employers, there are currently no structured return to work protocols for employers or for their workers encompassing best practice strategies to support a positive and timely return to work outcome. Purpose: To utilise the intervention mapping (IM) protocol as a framework to develop return to work toolkits that are underpinned by relevant behaviour change theory targeting mental health to promote a positive return to work experiensce for workers on long-term sick leave. Methods: This paper provides a worked example of intervention mapping (IM) to develop an intervention through a six-step process to combine theory and evidence in the development of two toolkits – one designed for managers and one to be used by workers on long-term sick leave. As part of this process, collaborative planning techniques were used to develop the intervention. A planning group was set up, through which researchers would work alongside employer, worker, and mental health professional representatives to develop the toolkits. Additionally, feedback on the toolkits were sought from the target populations of workers and managers and from wider employer stakeholders (e.g., human resource specialists). The implementation and evaluation of the toolkits as a workplace intervention were also planned. Results: Two toolkits were designed following the six steps of intervention mapping. Feedback from the planning group (n = 5; psychologist, psychiatrist, person with previous experience of poor mental health, employer and charity worker) and participants (n = 14; employers = 3, wellbeing director = 1; human resources = 2, managers = 2, employees with previous experience of poor mental health = 5) target populations indicated that the toolkits were acceptable and much needed. Conclusions: Using IM allowed the development of an evidence-based practical intervention, whilst incorporating the views of all the impacted stakeholder groups. The feasibility and acceptability of the toolkits and their supporting intervention components, implementation process and methods of assessment will be evaluated in a feasibility pilot randomised controlled trial.

Citation

Varela-Mato, V., Blake, H., Yarker, J., Godfree, K., Daly, G., Hassard, J., …Munir, F. (2023). Using intervention mapping to develop evidence-based toolkits that support workers on long-term sick leave and their managers. BMC Health Services Research, 23, Article 942. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-023-09952-0

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Aug 22, 2023
• Online Publication Date: Sep 2, 2023
• Publication Date: Sep 2, 2023
• Deposit Date: Sep 13, 2023
• Publicly Available Date: Sep 13, 2023
• Journal: BMC Health Services Research
• Electronic ISSN: 1472-6963
• Publisher: Springer Verlag
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 23
• Article Number: 942
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-023-09952-0
• Keywords: Return-to-work, Mental health, Intervention mapping, Support, Long-term sickness absence, Communication
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/25058122
• Publisher URL: https://bmchealthservres.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12913-023-09952-0
• Additional Information: Received: 2 February 2023; Accepted: 22 August 2023; First Online: 2 September 2023; : ; : The project has been granted ethical approval by the Loughborough University Ethical Advisory Committee (reference 4951). Workers and managers have provided written informed consent to participate in this study.; : All participants consented for their data to be used in the publication of scientific literature.; : None to be declared.