SLE and Employment: The Impact of Individulal and Contextual Factors

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The proposed project, "SLE and Employment: The Impact of Individual and Contextual Factors" has two principal aims: to describe the work dynamics of persons with SLE from the year of diagnosis (an average of 13 years before the study began) through 2010 and to assess the impact of characteristics of individuals with SLE (nature of their SLE, overall health status, demographics, and work history) and characteristics of the work, residential, and macroeconomic environment on employment outcomes. Of note, the project will assess the impact of specific job accommodations on the work outcomes of SLE. The principal data source for the project will be the Lupus Outcomes Study (LOS). In the LOS, about 1,175 persons with SLE are being followed through annual structured telephone interviews conducted by trained survey workers, augmented by data on the SLE from a comprehensive review of medical charts and analysis of biological material from buccal DMA and/or blood samples. The LOS data will be augmented by contextual information on the nature of the local communities of the LOS participants matched to the interview data at the level of the Census block group, by data on the local labor market from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and by data from the same source on the demand for labor in specific occupations and industries in the nation as a whole. In addition, the March Supplement to the Census Bureau's Current Population Survey (CPS) will be used to develop models of labor force participation. The models developed in the CPS will then be applied to the LOS data to provide estimates of the labor force participation of persons with SLE in the presence or absence of their illness. The project should provide the most systematic estimates of the work outcomes of SLE and of the factors affecting those outcomes. The information should help persons with SLE understand their work prognoses and should assist health care providers and rehabilitation professionals in devising strategies to reduce the prevalence of work disability.