Although the awareness and management of occupational health in construction has received far less attention than safety over the past ten to fifteen years, there is a great deal more activity now in the more enlightened areas of the industry.
The construction industry has demonstrated its ability to respond to serious injury and fatalities, as we did in 2001, when the then Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott called the industry to arms. Thirteen years on, we are in a much better place having reduced fatalities by two thirds.
Although the industry and many of the supporting body’s couple health and safety together to manage and control both, health has traditionally taken the back seat due the cause and effect in many cases taking decades to present symptoms and unlike safety, the burden of managing health falls predominantly to the employer . For these reasons the industry must find the means to elevate the status of health and make it an equal partner to safety.
Health is the most challenging topic and where most confusion reigns. Many engaged within the industry do not understand what is required of them as an employer and couple this with insufficient occupational health resource that is familiar with construction, then it is easy to see why we struggle with a workforce that is transient in the extreme.
There is confusion within the industry between occupational health management, occupational hygiene and well-being. All have a role to play and they are complimentary in engaging employers, employees and the population at large. The table below gives an overview:
| Occupational Health Management | Occupational Hygiene | Well-being |
| Occupational health deals with work related health issues; assessing and advising on the effect work could have on an employee’s health, and what effect an employees’ health may have on work. It is a two way process.The HSE states that good occupational health services are central to the effective management of workplace health. It fulfils the statutory requirements under current health and safety legislation.
Encouraging and supporting all employees to look after and manage their own health in support of their employer and particularly outside of work – the wider “Wellbeing” agenda.
Eliminating or managing all processes and materials/substances harmful to health by adopting a risk based approach. Providing management, supervisors and workers with the requisite skills, tools and procedures to manage the health risks identified.
Ensuring the right health assessments are carried out at the right intervals and any recommendations are acted upon. Employing professional OH expertise with the right qualifications, skills and construction experience to work with employers to safeguard the health of employees.
Maintaining appropriate health records for all employees and equipping them to have informed conversations with future employers about safeguarding their health. | Occupational hygienists get involved at the interface of people and their workplaces. They use science and engineering to prevent ill health caused by the work environment – specialising in the assessment and control of risks to health from workplace exposure to hazards. Hygienists help employers and employees to understand these risks and to minimize or eliminate them. Occupational hygienists can come from many backgrounds – chemists, engineers, biologists, physicists, doctors, nurses and others who have chosen to apply their skills to improving working practices and conditions. At their core is occupational hygiene – where science and engineering meet the human element of work (British Occupational Hygiene Society)The International Occupational Hygiene Association (IOHA) refers to occupational hygiene as the discipline of anticipating, recognizing, evaluating and controlling health hazards in the working environment with the objective of protecting worker health and well-being and safeguarding the community at large. | Public Health Responsibility Deal aims to work with industry to improve the nation’s health. There are five strands: food, alcohol, behavioural change, physical activity and health at work.There are a series of Pledges which employers are encouraged to select that best fit their business and are then required to record progress against. Responsibility Deal H10. is construction specific: As organisations working in the construction / civil engineering industries, we pledge to manage the causes of occupational disease and take action to improve the health and wellbeing of people working across offices and sites large and small. We recognise that prevention and early intervention is the key to success and will take on-going action on at least one of the following:
(1) Annual reporting of the health and wellbeing of employees (2) The provision of clinical occupational health services (OHS) that work in accordance with the relevant standards e.g. SEQOHS (3) Arrangements to develop a programme to actively promote health and wellbeing and the effective management of health.
Where relevant, we also pledge to encourage our subcontractors and supply chains to endorse at least one of the actions above to implement good health and wellbeing activities.
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In this episode of the Safety & Health Podcast, ‘Burnout, stress and being human’, Heather Beach is joined by Stacy Thomson to discuss burnout, perfectionism and how to deal with burnout as an individual, as management and as an organisation.
We provide an insight on how to tackle burnout and why mental health is such a taboo subject, particularly in the workplace.
As someone working in the chemical processing industry, I have argued for many years that the HSE and bodies like RoSPA and IOSH have concentrated far to much of their time and effort on the more immediate and identifiable causes of accidents. In my opinion, the far more important issue – that of cumulative effects resulting from small but frequent exposures to physical or chemical factors, has been pushed onto the back burner. I see the need to raise the profile of Occupational of health management and hygiene. However, the “well-being” agenda could be the thin end of a very… Read more »