I am often asked to see employees with musculoskeletal problems. As with all occupational health services, they make up about a third of my referrals. However I have noticed a recent trend. On four occasions in the last 6 months, the root cause of the problem appears to have been a new chair. Yes a [...]
If you and your colleagues turned up for work one morning, what would you do if your supervisor came in and said this? “Right folks, today we are going to do something seriously crass and stupid. It’s so crass and stupid that some of you might not actually make it home tonight as you will [...]
Health surveillance is any activity which involves obtaining information about employees' health and which helps protect employees from health risks at work. Ideally it should be identified in the risk assessment process. It is important to understand that the act of carrying out the health surveillance does not solve a health problem. A hearing test [...]
Some of you may be wondering why you need a policy about stress. Well, you need a policy about stress for the same reason you need a policy about every other significant impact on your business. A stress policy is an important component in setting out how an organization is going to manage work related [...]
My bank rang me the other day asking me if I had time to answer a few questions on their level of customer service. I normally shy away from these sort of phone calls with all the usual excuses; don’t like being rung up out of the blue, too busy, hate being interrupted in what [...]
Most back pain is not due to any serious disease and usually improves within a few days or couple of weeks. If you are affected by back pain, what you do in the early stages is very important. Backs need to keep working and the sooner you start moving and carrying on with normal daily [...]
There is a huge range of desks, mice, keyboards, monitors, pads, wrist rests, headsets and phones available to help those who find it difficult to manage with standard desktop equipment. Much of it is easy to purchase, cheap and easy to use so if it enables you to get someone back and fulfilling their role [...]
This is an occasional dilemma for both Human Resources and Occupational Health. Employers are often nervous of talking to an employee when they are off work. There is still the view, although it is becoming less common, that if they are unwell, they should be left at home to recover and not be troubled. More [...]
The picture is clear. Most of the world is broke and hasn’t a penny to scratch its arse with. The western world has been living beyond its means for 30 years and will bump along the bottom of the economic curve for another 10 years at least before the debts are paid off. Whoever thought that living on [...]