The Health and Safety Executive (HSE), Britain’s national regulator for workplace health and safety, have commissioned Affinity Health at Work, the Institute of Employment Studies, the Institute of Occupational Medicine, and the Society of Occupational Medicine to lead the Occupational Stress Consultation and Research Programme – otherwise known as Project OSCAR.
Not enough being done
17.1 million days were lost due to work-related stress in 2023[1] and almost half of all cases of work-related ill-health in the UK were caused by stress.
Furthermore, work-related stress is strongly linked to poor mental health outcomes, [2] and can lead to serious mood disorders, burnout, and suicide. [3,4,5,6] Work-related stress has significant negative consequences for employers contributing to increased absenteeism and presenteeism, reduced performance, lost productivity, job turnover and early retirement. [7,8,9,10].
Yet, despite strong, consistent evidence linking working conditions and psychosocial stressors to outcomes of work stress [11,12,13], the most recent CIPD health and wellbeing report [14] shows that only 40% of the 726 organisations surveyed are taking steps to identify causes of stress.
Call for evidence
To address this challenge, the HSE have commissioned Affinity Health at Work, the Institute of Employment Studies, the Institute of Occupational Medicine, and the Society of Occupational Medicine to lead the Occupational Stress Consultation and Research Programme (Project OSCAR).
This project aims to provide HSE with the evidence base on which to make policy decisions and underpin guidance on the practical actions that employers can take to prevent and mitigate work-related stress.
Specifically the project aims to:
i) Understand how work-related stress is defined and labelled, and
ii) Identify what interventions/ actions help to prevent and control work-related stress.
iii) Identify what are the barriers and facilitators experienced by organisations in controlling risks.
Via a call for evidence, Affinity Health at Work are currently looking for opinions, data, working definitions etc. The call for evidence is open until the end of September 2024. You can find out more details here: https://www.affinityhealthatwork.com/oscarcallforevidence
References:
[1] HSE (2023). Health and safety at work Summary statistics for Great Britain 2023. https://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/assets/docs/hssh2223.pdf
[2] Madsen, I. E. H., Nyberg, S. T., et al. (2017). Job strain as a risk factor for clinical depression: Systematic review and meta‐analysis with additional individual participant data. Psychological Medicine, 47, 1342–1356. https://doi.Org/10.1017/S003329171600355X
[3] Khamisa, N., Oldenburg, B., Peltzer, K., & Ilic, D. (2015). WRS, burnout, job satisfaction and general health of nurses. International journal of environmental research and public health, 12(1), 652-666.
[4] Howard, M. C., Follmer, K. B., Smith, M. B., Tucker, R. P., & Van Zandt, E. C. (2021). Work and suicide: An interdisciplinary systematic literature review. Journal of Organizational Behavior(2), 260–285. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.2519
[5] Dunning, A., Teoh, K., Martin, J., Spiers, J., Buszewicz, M., Chew-Graham, C., Taylor, A., Gopfert, A., Van Hove, M., Appleby, L., (2022). Relationship between working conditions and psychological distress experienced by junior doctors in the UK during the COVID-19 pandemic: a cross-sectional survey study. BMJ open, 12(8), e061331.
[6] Teoh, K. R. H., Dunning, A., Taylor, A. K., Gopfert, A., Chew-Graham, C. A., Spiers, J., … & Riley, R. (2024). Working conditions, psychological distress and suicidal ideation: cross-sectional survey study of UK junior doctors. BJPsych open, 10(1), e14.
[7] Knapp, M., & Wong, G. (2020). Economics and mental health: the current scenario. World Psychiatry., 19(1), 3–14.
[8] Hassard, J., Teoh, K. R. H., Visockaite, G., Dewe, P., & Cox, T. (2018). The cost of work‐related stress to society: A systematic review. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 23(1), 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1037/ocp0000069
[9] Kinman, G. (2019). Sickness presenteeism at work. British Medical Bulletin, 129, 1, 69-78 https://academic.oup.com/bmb/article-abstract/129/1/69/5288253.
[10] Kinman, G., Clements, A. J., & Hart, J. (2019). When are you coming back? Presenteeism in UK prison officers. The Prison Journal, 99(3), 363-383. https://doi.org/10.1177/0032885519838019
[11] Burman, R., & Goswami, T. G. (2018). A systematic literature review of work stress. International Journal of Management Studies, 3(9), 112-132.
[12] van der Molen, H. F., Nieuwenhuijsen, K., Frings-Dresen, M. H., & de Groene, G. (2020). Work-related psychosocial risk factors for stress-related mental disorders: an updated systematic review and meta-analysis. BMJ open, 10(7), e034849.
[13] Teoh, K., Singh, J., Medisauskaite, A., & Hassard, J. (2023). Doctors’ perceived working conditions, psychological health and patient care: a meta-analysis of longitudinal studies. Occupational and Environmental Medicine, 80(2), 61-69.
[14] CIPD (2023). Health and wellbeing being at work. Report.
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