Abstract
This study aimed to investigate differences in work disability duration among immigrants (categorized as economic, family member or refugee/other classification upon arrival to Canada) compared to Canadian-born workers with a work-related injury in British Columbia. Immigrants and Canadian-born workers were identified from linked immigration records with workers’ compensation claims for work-related back strain, connective tissue, concussion and fracture injuries requiring at least one paid day of work disability benefits between 2009 to 2015. Quantile regression investigated the relationship between immigration classification and predicted work disability days (defined from injury date to end of compensation claim, up to 365 days) and modeled at the 25th, 50th and 75th percentile of the distribution of the disability days. With a few exceptions, immigrants experienced greater predicted disability days compared to Canadian-born workers within the same injury cohort. The largest differences were observed for family and refugee/other immigrant classification workers, and, in particular, for women within these classifications, compared to Canadian-born workers. For example, at the 50th percentile of the distribution of disability days, we observed a difference of 34.1 days longer for refugee/other women in the concussion cohort and a difference of 27.5 days longer for family classification women in the fracture cohort. Economic immigrants had comparable disability days with Canadian-born workers, especially at the 25th and 50th percentiles of the distribution. Immigrant workers’ longer disability durations may be a result of more severe injuries or challenges navigating the workers’ compensation system with delays in seeking disability benefits and rehabilitation services. Differences by immigrant classification speak to vulnerabilities or inequities upon arrival in Canada that persist after entry to the workforce and warrant further investigation for early mitigation strategies.
Highlights
Immigrants represent approximately 28 percent of the workforce in the province of British Columbia, Canada [1], and the proportion of immigrant workers is growing, at younger ages [2]
16 percent of all claims in the connective tissue, concussion or upper/lower limb fracture injury cohorts occurred among immigrant workers across the three classifications, while nearly 20 percent of all claims in the back strain injury cohort occurred among immigrant workers across the three classifications
The majority of claims were for men; for workers employed in trades and transport or sales and service occupations; and for workers aged 45 to 54 years, the concussion cohort had a greater proportion of young workers aged 15 to 24 years (20%) compared to other injury cohorts
Summary
Immigrants represent approximately 28 percent of the workforce in the province of British Columbia, Canada [1], and the proportion of immigrant workers is growing, at younger ages [2]. Jobs available to immigrant workers are often known as the 3-Ds—dirty, dangerous and demanding—and reflect a pattern of immigrant workers being constrained in their labor market choice and restricted to hazardous jobs [3]. As a result of more hazardous working conditions and environments, immigrant workers have an increased risk of work-related injuries, illnesses and disability compared with native-born workers. In a review of immigrants’ occupational injuries globally, Salminen and colleagues found that immigrant workers experienced work-related injuries twice as often as native-born workers in part because of their adverse working conditions [4].
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