Self-efficacy to return to work: A focus for practice in occupational medicine

The sustainable return to work of workers diagnosed with a chronic disease is a major issue in occupational medicine practice. As a multifactorial process, return to work depends, among other things, on psychological factors, including the self-efficacy to return to work. This is a cognitive mechanism reflecting an individual's belief that he or she can carry out the actions required to return to work; to be distinguished from the notion of work ability. Based on a series of literature reviews, this paper aims to: (i) define the specific features of the self efficacy to return to work; (ii) introduce the knowledge related to the return to work of patients diagnosed with a chronic disease; (iii) present the questionnaires promoting its evaluation; and (iv) present the intervention strategies available within the scientific literature. We discuss the value of using specific measures of self-efficacy to return to work, from both a conceptual and clinical point of view. Various questionnaires are presented so that occupational health practitioners and/or researchers can take them up and include them in their clinical and/or scientific practices.