The cost of workplace accidents and diseases, both physical and psychological, are incurred by way of medical and hospital costs, time lost, replacement costs, injury management, occupational rehabilitation and workers compensation payment/premiums. The ultimate objective of Work Health Options (WHO) is to assist our clients in preventing accidents and minimising losses to a point as low as is reasonably practical.
Through our relationships with agents and insurers we are able to obtain access to their own in-house services or look at risk management for internal tailored support or external programmes of your choice.
Pre-Employment and Absenteeism Management
The majority of injuries are a result of strains and sprains in the workplace. In fact over 39% of WHO’s clients ‘claims are related to sprains and strains.
Whilst much of the general population may suffer from underlying conditions, some are more susceptible of aggravating their underlying and asymptomatic (without symptoms) condition no matter what their age. Therefore a means of elevating the risk of hiring persons who may end up injuring themselves whilst employed, WHO believe in the use of Pre-Placement Medicals across the diverse range of their client base.
WHO has a sophisticated pathway management solution for pre-employment assessment and absenteeism management. Our comprehensive approach allows for the booking, diagnosis, records and checklist management for your pre-employment assessment. In addition, our absenteeism tracking and reporting gives you everything you need for your employee performance monitoring.
Employment Pathways
- Book Doctor preemployment assessment appointments
- Track and manage laboratory results
- Request and store police checks
- Absentee registration, reporting and analysis
Early Diagnosis in Injury Management
WHO provides the most effective and efficient concierge services for early diagnosis, enabling your injured workers to get the right advice at the right time. We provide the injured worker faster and more accurate information, allowing them to either stay at work or return to work in a more timely fashion.
WHO Early Diagnosis
- Immediate Online Diagnostic Assessments & Knowledge Base
- 24/7 Clinical Call Centre
- 24/7 On-Call Tier-2 Clinical Professional Network
- 24/7 On-Call Tier-3 Emergency Specialist Network
Employee Assistance Programme (EAP)
Did you know that mental illness affects one in five Australians? This means most working Australian’s will at some point work alongside a person with a mental illness.
Depression alone is estimated to cost employers 3.5 billion dollars a year through absenteeism and reduced productivity. Depression accounts for six million full working days lost each year (Mental Health Council of Australia).
WHO have identified through our experience in the workers compensation industry, that many of the psychological claims that are lodged, a significant number have pre-existing stressors (issues) that have an impact on their life. Therefore, when an event or a series of issues in the workplace come about it can easily escalate and turn into a claim. At this point it can prove to be rather difficult to dispute the relationship work has had on the person, in comparison to the non-work related issues in their life.
WHO strongly believes the implementation of an EAP programme will assist with:
- Management of potential psychological claims
- Help maintain employee work life balance
- Reduce absenteeism
- Assist with staff retention
WHO partners with a specialist provider of EAP programmes who are relied upon by Australia’s largest companies and government agencies.
WHO's partnership is based on the support of over 380 qualified personnel and nearly 50 years’ experience. Like WHO, our partners are a highly professional, Australian Owned organisation that are passionate and committed to working with our clients to develop healthy, productive workplaces and employees in a remarkable and dynamic way. Experience in various industries is vital and hence includes government agencies, business services, retail, mining, manufacturing, healthcare, utilities, transport and insurance.
The areas that WHO identified to be of most benefit to our clients are:
- EAP – Provision of a free call 1800 number to provide access to services 24 hours a day, 7 days per week.
When a call is made the nature of the issue is identified. At this point an appointment is made for either a face to face session or a telephone session based on the service requirements of WHO’s client or location of the employee. However, if it is identified there has been a critical incident it is then escalated.
- Critical Incident Management & Response – A critical incident is any sudden event that causes staff to experience strong emotional reactions which may interfere with their mental and physical state and their work performance.
WHO wanted their client to be contacted following an incident and guaranteed a telephone response within 15 minutes to assess the situation by a trained clinical psychologist. WHO also placed importance on the ability, should there be a need, to respond with a face-to-face crisis consultation, onsite counselling and support within 2 hours in most regions.
Continuing ongoing support in the days and weeks following the event to assist with the individual, or the organisations staff to ensure they cope, recover and restore to normal functioning is also a service level expectation from WHO.
- Manager Assistance Programme – the provision of a Manager Assistance Programme that is designed to assist managers and supervisors to deal with difficult people management issues. This service provides added value by transferring skills to managers and supervisors that help enhance their management ability.
- Reporting – the provision to WHO’s clients of periodical reports or statistical data on utilisation, trends or issues arising across divisions and locations. The data is intended to aid in effective strategic human resource planning and training identification within the organisation.