A contract shall be signed with 1 service provider for research assistance with the evaluation of decision support.

What shall be evaluated — further details on decision support.

ASD and HOD refer to the fact that the Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration have proved that there are county differences in the length of sick leave for persons with the same diagnosis and that these differences are the same when you look at persons on sick leave within the same industry. The picture of considerable county differences in length within the different industries is confirmed in analyses which take different gender and age groups in the counties into consideration. The finds indicate that there are conditions beyond industry structure, gender and age group that are significant when explaining the differences in sick leave and the sick leave pattern on a county level.

Development work shall be commissioned, based on this, under the management of the Directorate of Health with assistance from the Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration, with the intention of implementing decision support for persons who grant sick leave. The implementation of the decision support can contribute to quality assuring the work involved with sick leave and the follow-up of sick leave.

The following guidelines will form the basis for the decision support:

— The decision support shall provide knowledge based advice to persons who grant sick leave on (full) relief, adapted work, stepping up work for diagnoses where possible. General advice on follow-up is given for other diagnoses.

— The decision support shall be connected to the existing professional guide for persons who grant sick leave, which provides general advice on assessing medical principles in order to clarify an ability to work, activity possibilities and facilitation, guiding the patient and interaction between actors in the sick leave work.

— The decision support shall describe the recommended sick leave length and type for various diagnoses, based on medical advice.

— The decision support shall be developed for diagnoses (conditions and post-operative recovery) where it is medically responsible to state a time period for the expected reduced ability to work.

— The development work will be delimited to the ICPC diagnosis system.

— Allowances shall be made for the integration of the decision support in the family doctors' electronic patient journal system (EPJ systems), based on the available technology and systems.

— The decision support shall be available nationwide.

The evaluation process.

The decision support shall be gradually implemented from 1.1.2016 for the diagnoses for which it is considered to be medically responsible to start with.

The following guidelines shall form the basis of the evaluation of the decision support:

—Qualitative analyses shall be carried out including an examination of:

o the experience that the person who grants sick leave has with decision support;

o NAV's experiences with decision support

— Relevant research competence is a prerequisite for carrying out the evaluation;

— The extent of the evaluation will be decided in cooperation with the contracting authority.

The contract's content and extent.

The service provider shall be responsible for:

— working out a design and method for carrying out the evaluation, in cooperation with the contracting authority, which can be suitable for identifying the effects of decision support;

— carrying out the evaluation, including handling the collection, storage and analysis of data/information;

— having a dialogue with the contracting authority throughout the project period;

— reporting the status from the evaluation to the contracting authority during the evaluation, including financial reports;

— reporting the results from the evaluation in a final report, where the effects of decision support are described.