Work participation in an early osteoarthritis cohort

Summary:

The Dutch Reumafonds started CHECK, the Cohort Hip and Cohort Knee. CHECK is a 10-year, multicentre cohort study on early osteoarthritis of the knee and/or the hip. This focus of this project is on work participation. Characteristics of the cohort subjects will be described at T0, T1 and T2 and associations between participation and impairments and activities will be analysed. Another question is which physical, mental and social factors are determinants for work participation.

In a spin-off study on 92 subjects from the centers of Groningen and Enschede the capacity for work related activities will be assessed with a Functional Capacity Evaluation (FCE). Results will be compared with self reports to assess the concurrent validity and the predictive validity of the FCE for work participation will be measured. A systematic review of the literature will be performed on the relation between work load and osteoarthritis of the knee and the hip.