Occupational musculoskeletal and mental disorders as the most frequent associations to worker's sickness absence: a 10-year cohort study.

Background: Sickness absence (SA) is a complex phenomenon influenced by the health of the worker and socio-economic factors. An epidemiological study of SA has never been conducted for Brazilian university workers. This study aimed to determine the main diseases that are associated with SA and find out the average length of SA duration, and its variation among different staff members and between sexes over the 10-year study period.