This report aims to analyze sick leave rates among healthcare professionals from 16 Basic Healthcare Units of the Brazilian National Unified Healthcare System (SUS) in the Municipality of Campinas during 2002. Data on worked days and sick leaves of 311 nurses and nursing aides working at Healthcare Centers of the North and East regions of the municipality of Campinas were obtained at the central administration, in order to calculate the frequency, severity and proportion of lost working time. Variables used were time on the job, job title, gender and weekly hour load. Results of the present study were compared with other published reports on sick leave rates in hospitals, manufacturing, and service settings. Most of the studied population comprised nursing aides and other healthcare technicians (82.6%), 90.6% had a weekly work load of 36 hours, and 93.5% of the group were women. Absenteeism frequency rate was of 2.88 new sick leaves per employee/year. The severity index was of 12.27 lost working days per employee/year, and the proportion of work time lost was 5.56% a year. Registered Nurses had lower frequency rates than nursing aides and technicians. Findings pointed to higher indexes and rates when compared with hospital data from other publications. A proposal is presented to minimize this phenomenon that results from the impact of conditions that are unfavorable to workers' health, through the reduction of the workload and the improvement of public health policy for this group of workers.
Absenteeism; Epidemiology; Occupational health; Working conditions
