An assessment of occupational health care in the Netherlands (1996–2005)

Abstract

The extensive Dutch occupational health care system of the past decade has not led to the desired outcomes, namely, a decrease of work absenteeism and the associated costs. To assess the differences between in-house and external occupational health care services in the process quality of occupational health care provided. In total, 26 interviews were conducted with chief executive officers of occupational health services (OHS). The responses and other relevant policy documents were analysed and described. A key component of this process was to compare differences between in-house and external services. Notable differences in quality were found to exist between in-house and external occupational health care systems, with the in-house occupational health care services offering the highest process quality. Our findings suggest that the effectiveness of OHS is mainly dependent on their structure (in-house versus external) and on economic factors (profit driven versus not for profit).