It is important that correctional facilities manage employee attendance because many of the posts in prisons cannot be vacated, which may mean mandatory overtime or disruptions to other employees when personnel use sick leave. Despite the importance of personnel management issues in prisons, relatively little research attention has been focused on the use of sick leave for correctional employees. The current study examined data from the 1994 Prison Social Climate Survey of 4,122 correctional employees to probe potential antecedents of employee use of sick leave. Variables under investigation included job satisfaction, organizational commitment, job stress, health factors, and employee characteristics. Results of statistical analyses indicated that job satisfaction and organizational commitment had a negative impact on correctional staff absenteeism, while job stress had a positive effect on absenteeism among correctional staff. Only one of four health variables impacted absenteeism: employees who were overweight used more sick leave than those who were not overweight. Finally, of the employee characteristics that impacted absenteeism, gender was the most significant predictor of the use of sick leave, with female employees using more sick leave than male employees. Future research should continue to probe the important issue of correctional employee absenteeism because of the deleterious impact absenteeism has on the industry. Tables, references