The institution undertakes measures to identify cases of occupational health issues and to intervene as early as possible. In order to facilitate the process of notification of occupational diseases, the institution cooperates with the medical profession, the social partners and inspection services.
Guideline code
PREV_02900
Mechanism
Mechanism
- The prevention department should evaluate different measures to enable an early detection of occupational diseases, for example through self-conducted inspections, occupational health services and regular check-ups or risk assessments at the workplace.
- The prevention department should collaborate with primary health care professionals. Training and qualification programmes may be organized to enable the medical profession to not only diagnose the symptoms but understand the occupational causes of the disease. Training programmes may also provide the medical profession with a better understanding of the demands at the workplace, enabling to better assess the degree to which the patient is able to work.
- In order to ensure that occupational diseases are reported, the prevention department provides training and information to medical professionals and creates communication channels for individuals to report a suspected occupational disease to the institution.
- The prevention department should ensure that standards for physical and/or psychological check-ups are developed for use as guidelines for physicians and other medical staff, to ensure that examinations are standardized.
- The management should ensure that a suitable infrastructure is established to support physicians conducting preventive examinations. This includes contracting physicians qualified in the field of occupational medicine and ensuring they are technically equipped, qualified and competent to use such equipment for the diagnosis of particular diseases (e.g. an x-ray unit to detect pneumoconiosis).
- The prevention department should organize long-term follow-up examinations in order to detect adverse effects on health which have a long period of latency (e.g. exposure to carcinogenic substances such as asbestos), including for workers who have moved to a different area of work or retired.
- The examining prevention professional should immediately intervene if there are short periods of latency or no latencies. If latencies are long, the origin of diseases are difficult to detect and therefore difficult to treat. Exposures should be analysed and risks should be minimized that foster the emergence of occupational diseases.
- The examining prevention professional’s early intervention actions should:
- Provide for a new risk assessment of the workplace (depending on the nature of the occupational disease and the risk exposure);
- Feed information back to the occupational physicians in order to prevent more occupational diseases in similar working conditions;
- Foresee the provision of adequate medical treatment.
- To improve the reporting of occupational diseases, health and safety professionals should be sensitized by training and information. This can be done via info-brochures of the social security institutions or through campaigns and websites. To make it easier for individuals to report an occupational disease to the institution, direct communication channels should be established, for example a help line or information on the website.
Structure
Structure
- The board should request the competent national authorities to define a legal framework ensuring that all employees to be exposed to potential health hazards at work undergo a systematic medical health screening before starting hazardous work and are periodically re-examined.
- The board should set up systematic collaboration with primary health care professionals and health insurances to detect and address occupational diseases as early as possible with their help.
- The board should set up structures to ensure an early detection of occupational diseases rather than realize later that they are occurring, through self-conducted inspections, occupational health services and health screenings. Also, risk assessments at the workplace should be carried out. The board should allocate funds for a preventive medicine service.
- The prevention department should ensure that interventions are taken as early as possible. Interventions should be determined by the type of occupational diseases as well as by their latencies.
- The board should ensure that occupational diseases are reported to the appropriate authorities.
Title HTML
Guideline 22. Early detection and intervention
Type
Guideline_1
Weight
33