Title
Preemployment medical examinations in a large occupational health service
Author
Medisch Biologisch Laboratorium TNO
de Kort, W.L.A.M.
Fransman, L.G.
van Dijk, F.J.H.
Publication year
1991
Abstract
Several hundreds of thousands of preemployment medical examinations are performed in The Netherlands each year, with the objective of screening for obvious risks for the applicants or others. Neither the efficacy of these examinations nor determinants for rejection are known. Altogether 101,754 preemployment medical examinations of applicants for governmental functions were analyzed. For one-fifth of the applicants some medical diagnosis was recorded. The overall rejection percentage was 0.6 %, being highest for job categories involving public safety and high physical demands, but never exceeding 4 %. Age was positively correlated with rejection percentage. Except for the diagnostic category 'disorders of the musculoskeletal system' no relation between diagnostic category and job demands was apparent. Medical diagnoses frequently encountered among rejected applicants were also common among successful applicants. If selection aiming at reducing absenteeism or work disablement is considered to be the only goal of preemployment medical examinations, then their efficacy appears to be low for many job categories. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Subject
Absenteeism
Efficacy
Health screening
Personnel selection
Prevention
Work disablement
Absenteeism
Diagnosis
Examination
Mass screening
Occupational health service
Personnel
Preemployment medical examination
Prevention
Priority journal
Risk factor
Screening
Work disability
Absenteeism
Adult
Female
Human
Job Application
Male
Middle Age
Netherlands
Occupational Diseases
Physical Examination
Risk Factors
Work Capacity Evaluation
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TNO identifier
231408
ISSN
0355-3140
Source
Scandinavian Journal of Work, Environment and Health, 17 (17), 392-397
Document type
article