Introduction The literature reports that many of the causal factors related to sickness absenteeism are linked to working conditions and the absence from work often means by which the worker would escape a confliting situation.Having this central question indexes is studied in Absenteeism of institutions in which the author practiced occupational medicine.

Methods Retrospective study of 6183 workers with absence periods of up to 15 days, during the years 1989 to 2004 of a private general hospital, two public health services, a public education unit and a large private food industry in the region of Ribeirão Preto. Traditional absenteeism indices (severity, frequency, average length of leave, frequency per individual and average license per person) are used according to age, length of service, occupational group, gender, former employees and employees of the same institution And employees with concomitant links at two institutions.

Result The rates are higher at the extremes of age, in women, the unskilledfoccupational group among the dismissed employees and public entities.

Discussion The profile is similar to other studies indicating motivational influence mainly on comparing concomitant double bond of workers (higher absenteeism in the public service where there is stability guaranteed by law). The double work/home journey and greater concern about the state of health may be influencing the female sex. The occupational group presents an increase of the indices directly proportional to the decrease of the schooling and the responsibilities of the tasks. Real morbidity seems to influence the indexes of the oldest and youngest, and institutions have increased indexes since the second year of attachment (adaptation to the climate of absenteeism of each institution). The results demand a global managerial action discarding the isolated participation of the Service of Medicine of the work, usual practice in our country, in the control of the absenteeism by diseas.