Barriers to good sickness certification -- an interview study with Swedish general practitioners.

Background: To date, there is no gold standard for sick-listing practices, and physicians find sickness certification problematic. Measures have been taken to improve physician's sick-listing practices, but with ambiguous results. To be able to make such interventions effective, it is important to identify and target barriers to good practices.

Sick-listing as a psychosocial work problem: a survey of 3997 Swedish physicians.

Objectives: To quantify the extent of emotionally straining sick-listing problems among three categories of physicians and find associations with workplace characteristics.

Methods: A questionnaire was answered by 3997 physicians (response rate: 71%).

Results: A larger proportion of physicians at orthopaedic clinics and, in particular, at Primary Health Care Centres (PHCCs), experienced sick-listing problems, compared to physicians at other clinics.