This morning the Personnel Today and Occupational Health journal team arrived at Dame Carol Black's office to record a video interview with her, hoping to give a bit more insight into how her recent review of the health of the working age, Working for a Healthier Tomorrow, would affect employers, managers and health professionals. Most of the standard TV coverage on the day of the launch focused on fit notes and getting people off incapacity benefit so this is the first television interview which looks at her recommendations in any depth. We will make the video available later this week but here are a couple of snippets of what she said on key issues.
Asked if we needed lots more occupational health nurses and doctors, Dame Carol said she didn't want to be prescriptive about numbers but said it was the different groups themselves to decide in collaboration.
I don't think we can do that [determine numbers of doctors or nurses needed] unless the porfessionals get themselves together - the doctors, physiotherapists, the vocational rehabilitationists need to understand what each of them bring to this and think how they would be needed.
Dame Carol also said that overly traditional occupational health approaches were not her idea of the right OH for today.
Do I think of the classic occupational health as was started 40 or 50 years ago? No, because I see in my trips around the country many companies that are doing what might be called OH that have embraced promotion of health and wellbeing.
Watch her talk about GPs, leadership of the remodelled NHS and standards of OH delivery later this week.
