NHS England’s long-term workforce plan has reiterated the need for NHS organisations to invest in occupational health and wellbeing, but lacks detail around whether there will be greater investment in OH nurses and doctors.
The keenly-anticipated long-term workforce plan outlines how the government will invest in more training places for doctors, nurses and dentists in England, and how NHS England will improve staff retention.
Although it recognises the importance of supporting the health and wellbeing of the NHS workforce, and suggests that local leaders should ensure occupational health and wellbeing services are accessible for all staff, the report offers limited detail on how this is to be achieved.
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It says that integrated care systems (ICSs) – networks of organisations that act as partners to deliver joined-up health and care services – should “develop and implement plans to invest in occupational health and wellbeing services”.
It says these should align with the national Growing Occupational Health and Wellbeing (OHWB) Together strategy along with the ICS design framework.
The plan says: “NHS England will work with systems and stakeholders to consider how best to complement local investment in OHWB services to keep staff well and therefore increase workforce capacity and productivity.
“The Growing OHWB Together strategy sets an approach to improve health and wellbeing support practices to keep people well. It goes beyond reducing sickness absence, taking a preventative approach through system-wide, integrated and multidisciplinary services. Such approaches make good business sense. For example, the University of East Anglia and RAND Europe demonstrate that investment of £80 per member of staff in mental health support can achieve net gains of £855 a year through savings from absenteeism and presenteeism.
“While local context will drive priorities, a core offer could include rapid access to mental health and musculoskeletal advice, guidance and treatment services. As set out in the Fuller Stocktake report, ICSs should look to extend occupational health and wellbeing provision across primary care organisations.”
The NHS England long-term workforce plan also highlights the role that the government’s forthcoming consultation on increasing occupational health uptake will play in identifying the composition of the multidisciplinary workforce needed to deliver OH support to the wider working population.
“Responses will be used to inform ongoing occupational health workforce planning. Occupational health professionals can advise on employment and support people to return to and remain in work, which benefits individuals and the wider economy, as well as the delivery of NHS services,” the document says.
Nick Pahl, CEO of the Society of Occupational Medicine (SOM), said further detail around the requirement for occupational health nurses and doctors was needed.
“We will be feeding back to ensure this plan supports the scale up of occupational health to meet our ambition of universal access to occupational health. Details will be crucial – that it will be funded and implemented, with regular reviews and updates. The commitment to refresh it every two years is a good start,” he said.
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“We hope also to support local leaders to take a clearer role in the leadership of occupational health to support people to return and remain in work.
“I welcome the focus on prevention to retain staff, taking into account the high sickness absence rates in the NHS announced recently.”
