Self-management process after a work accident: A gender analysis

Abstract

The return to the professional activity after a work accident corresponds to a complex process, whose path often reveals inequality factors, especially if we look at it through the gender lens. Under the scope of the project “Return-to-work after an accident: to overcome obstacles” carried out in Portugal together with the National Association of Disabled Workers Injured On-the-job, with 371 participants, the circumstances and the consequences of the work accidents were analyzed. Although the gender dimension was not considered at the origin of the investigation, the study’s methodological layout took into account the representativeness of men and women for the purposes of sample constitution and findings’ analysis – findings that show a clear inequality especially in the moments prior to the accident and in the reinsertion process. Consequently, there seems to be a tendency towards the precariousness in the job and working conditions after the accident: for men, apart from the salary, the unemployment allowance emerges as the main source of income, while in the case of women the sick pay prevails as income source. From the perspective of the working conditions of those who return to the same company after the accident, most participants do not get a readjusted workstation or work schedule and there is a sense that the job is on the line, reported particularly by women.