Labour Force Participation in Adults with Osteoarthritis (OA) or Joint Symptoms Typical of OA: Findings from a Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of the study is to examine the relationship between osteoarthritis (OA) and joint symptoms typical of OA and labour force participation.

METHODS: Data are from the baseline questionnaire of the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging for respondents aged 45-74 years at baseline (n=24,427). Individuals were categorized into one of five mutually exclusive arthritis status groups: diagnosed OA; diagnosed other type of arthritis; 2-3 symptomatic joint sites/no diagnosed arthritis; 1 symptomatic joint site/no diagnosed arthritis; no arthritis/no joint symptoms. Age-stratified robust log-Poisson regression analysis was used to examine the association between arthritis status and labour force participation.

RESULTS: Overall 39% of the analytic sample reported being out of the labour force. Those with OA aged 45-54 and 55-64 years were significantly more likely to be out of the labour force than those with no arthritis/no joint symptoms, prevalence ratio (PR) 1.34 [95% CI 1.10-1.65] and PR 1.13 [95% CI 1.06-1.21] respectively, with similar results for those with 2-3 joint symptoms/no OA in the 45-54 year age group (PR 1.37 [95% CI 1.07-1.76]). There was no difference for those aged 65-74 years. Being an informal caregiver increased the likelihood of non-participation in the labour force for those aged 55-64 years, PR 1.09 [95% CI 1.04-1.15].

CONCLUSION: Our results suggest that an exclusive reliance on an OA diagnosis to understand impact on labour force participation may miss a large segment of the middle-aged population which may have undiagnosed OA or are at greater risk of OA because of joint problems.