Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Personnel Today

Register
Log in
Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

NHSHR strategyEmployer brandingOrganisation development

Government body to issue proposals on NHS OH revamp

by Noel O'Reilly 31 Jan 2011
by Noel O'Reilly 31 Jan 2011

New guidelines that could radically change how NHS occupational health services operate, their oversight and even their branding are due to be unveiled in March 2011.

The Task and Finish Group, which was set up by the Government to implement the recommendations of Dr Stephen Boorman’s NHS Health and Wellbeing 2009 report on staff health in the NHS, is set to recommend that:



  • NHS OH services are to be rebranded as “NHS occupational health and wellbeing centres”;
  • quarterly key performance indicators for OH services are introduced;
  • pilots are established whereby NHS regional OH professionals are based in local authority departments of public health.
  • all NHS OH services are to be required to have achieved the Faculty of Occupational Medicine’s Safe Effective Quality Occupational Health Service (SEQOHS) accreditation by March 2012, or to be able to clearly show they are ready to get it; and
  • a “Wellbeing Improvement Framework” be created to monitor the aim of making the £555 million productivity savings identified in the Boorman report.

The overhaul was unveiled at a conference in January, where new NHS Plus director John Harrison said that OH services faced a challenging future, particularly around the uncertainty about how services will be commissioned in future.

In the wake of the Government’s public health White Paper Healthy Lives, Healthy People, published in December 2010, local authority public health managers will be taking at least some responsibility for the commissioning of OH services currently based in the NHS, he pointed out.

Sign up to our weekly round-up of HR news and guidance

Receive the Personnel Today Direct e-newsletter every Wednesday

OptOut
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Harrison stressed that OH services needed to improve their efficiency and quality in response to these changes. There was no “one-size-fits-all solution” for improving the quality of NHS OH services, he said, but the regional area collaborative service model being developed by some NHS providers might be adopted more widely.

“It’s very important that we deliver on the quality agenda,” said Harrison. “I suspect that in some situations it’s not going to be possible to deliver that agenda with the current configuration of services,” he added.

Noel O'Reilly

I am a writer, journalist, novelist, Follow me on Twitter @noeloreilly

previous post
Case of the week: Mehta v Child Support Agency
next post
Absence increase has negative impact across businesses

You may also like

NHS 10-year Health Plan sets out vision for...

3 Jul 2025

Top 10 HR questions June 2025: Redundancy consultation

2 Jul 2025

One in eight senior NHS managers from black...

1 Jul 2025

Barts nurse told to remove watermelon image claims...

19 Jun 2025

Number of new nurses from abroad falls by...

18 Jun 2025

Overseas dentists ‘working in McDonald’s’ due to backlog

18 Jun 2025

Spending Review: ‘Much-needed’ cash but ‘little on workforce’

11 Jun 2025

CIPD Festival of Work: ‘Wellbeing is not an...

11 Jun 2025

Healthdaq: Shaking up health and social care recruitment

11 Jun 2025

Two-thirds of workers still struggling to access GPs...

10 Jun 2025

  • Empowering working parents and productivity during the summer holidays SPONSORED | Businesses play a...Read more
  • AI is here. Your workforce should be ready. SPONSORED | From content creation...Read more

Personnel Today Jobs
 

Search Jobs

PERSONNEL TODAY

About us
Contact us
Browse all HR topics
Email newsletters
Content feeds
Cookies policy
Privacy policy
Terms and conditions

JOBS

Personnel Today Jobs
Post a job
Why advertise with us?

EVENTS & PRODUCTS

The Personnel Today Awards
The RAD Awards
Employee Benefits
Forum for Expatriate Management
OHW+
Whatmedia

ADVERTISING & PR

Advertising opportunities
Features list 2025

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Linkedin


© 2011 - 2025 DVV Media International Ltd

Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+