disability and medical leave due to psychiatric disorders in tehran social security organization clients

the purpose of this study was to investigate disability and medical leave due to psychiatric disorders in patients referred to comission for psychiatric and neurological consultation of 682 patients who had been referred to the comission during 1993-94. results showed that psychiatric disorders and mood disorders led to occupational disability and medical leave at a significantly higher rate than neurological disorders. 56.9% of disabilities and 83.5% of medical leave were due to psychiatric disorders. 43.1 % of disabled and 16.5% of medical leave were due to neurological disorders. 32.3% of disabled patients were unskilled worker and 28.3% of those on medical leave were skilled workers. the average age of disability was 46 which lost 14 years service (1974 years). the mean age and years of service in the group on medical leave were significantly less than the disabled group but the extent of their leave was equal to the disabled group (5.2 months versus 5.5 respectively). this difference was not statistically significant, especially considering that the number of clients on medical leave were 4 times more than disabled clients. if the lost days of service is divided to the number of clients in each group, on the average, those on medical leave and those on disability had lost 64.3 and 23.3 work days respectively.