OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH MANAGEMENT MODEL
FOR THE CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY
HSE’s Construction Sector has produced a draft Occupational Health Management Model (OHMM) for the construction industry, and they want your views on it.
The OHMM is available free of charge for use online or to download onto your computer by selecting the links below.
The OHMM
·
It is estimated that 96,000 people whose current or most recent job in
the last year was in the construction industry suffered from ill health which was
caused or made worse by their job.
·
The prevalence rate
in construction was significantly higher that that for the all industry
average.
The most prevalent health issues in the construction industry include manual handling (or musculoskeletal disorders (MSD)), hand arm vibration syndrome (HAVS), noise induced hearing loss (NIHL), and dermatitis. MSD affects 5% of the construction workforce (or around 90,000 people). The prevalence of HAVS is 6 times the all industry average, and NIHL is double the all-industry average. Around 10% of the bricklaying industry leave their profession due to contact dermatitis from wet cement. Stress may also be inherent within the industry due the nature of construction business such as working to tight deadlines, adverse environmental conditions and significant resource pressures.
Recognising this, the OHMM provides:
·
Simple advice
useful to small organisations and sufficiently detailed for large organisations
·
A clear steer on
minimum standards of occupational health management
·
Advice on all
stages of occupational health management
·
Advice on specific
health issues including MSD, HAVS, NIHL, Dermatitis and Stress
All of this is available free of charge for use online or to download onto your computer by selecting the links provided.
Piloting the OHMM
To ensure that the OHMM is user friendly and practical, HSE is piloting the OHMM with a range of construction organisations to seek information on:
· The organisations understanding of the role of the OHMM.
· Whether, and to what extent, organisations have implemented the OHMM and, if not, why not.
· What changes, if any have been introduced in the organisations as a result of implementing part or all of the OHMM.
· Organisations’ views on the content and usability of the OHMM.
Questionnaire and Feedback
To obtain this information, we would be grateful if you could complete two questionnaires, one before you view the model, and the second at the end of the pilot period.
· The baseline questionnaire is included in the download version of the OHMM or it can be downloaded separately.
· An evaluation questionnaire will be provided at the end of the pilot period.
We need your contact details in order to ascertain how many
organisations have shown interest in the OHMM and to ensure that you receive
the evaluation questionnaire at a later date.
All responses will be treated in the strictest confidence. BOMEL is an
independent research and consultancy organisation. Your organisation’s name and address will not
be passed to the HSE or made available to any other parties without your
consent. The results of this survey will
be aggregated to evaluate the OHMM pilot as a whole. Any openly available report will not identify
individual contributors.