Safeguarding health and well-being for employees – the value of occupational health services
pharmafile | December 1, 2025 | Feature | Medical Communications | Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, Society of Occupational Medicine, employee health and well-being, occupational health, workplace sickness absence levels
With workplace sickness absence levels stuck at record levels, employers need to step-change how they think about and manage employee ill health. Importantly, they need to recognise that the value of occupational health (OH) services goes beyond simply supporting employees who are unwell.
Earlier this year, the president of the Society of Occupational Medicine (SOM) commented on research from the HR body, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), that showed the average UK worker took nearly two full working weeks of sick leave in the past year, a record high.
The CIPD’s 2025 Health and Wellbeing at Work report found employees last year took off on average 9.4 days a year, compared with 5.8 before the COVID-19 pandemic in 2019, and an increase on the 7.8 days reported just two years ago1.
Professor Neil Greenberg, SOM president, commented: “Too often employees have to be absent for a defined period – often many weeks – before even being referred to occupational health.
“That is a missed opportunity. Waiting weeks before making a referral often means that employees’ health problems are more complex and difficult to manage when they see an occupational health professional. This can lead to undesirable outcomes such as being forced out of work and [can make] an early, medical retirement much more likely.”
One way employers have been responding to this worrying increase – positively – is through greater investment in occupational and workplace health support, including access to OH professionals, digital GPs, virtual physiotherapy, online counselling and health-related benefits and insurance.
In fact, the CIPD research has shown that OH services are now offered by more than two-thirds of employers (69%) – a significant uplift on the approximately half of employees estimated by the government to have such access a few years ago2.
Access to occupational health support is more common in larger organisations (more than 250 employees). Employees in 86% of such organisations benefit from the health and work expertise that OH professionals provide.
Currently, only a minority of employers (just 31% according to the CIPD research) use OH professionals proactively to prevent ill health risks from occurring in the first place. Even fewer (29%) use the expertise of OH practitioners to develop and map out a comprehensive health and well-being strategy for their organisation.
This means that, all too frequently, employees go on sick leave and are repeatedly signed off by their GP, often on an NHS waiting list for treatment. A more effect approach, according to SOM, would be for an employee whose health is deteriorating to be seen before, or very soon after, they go off sick and provided with the right support based on occupational health advice – so they can remain at work or return to work quickly.
Greenberg said: “The government [needs] to reduce the number of people falling out of the workplace [due to] ill health – it’s bad for the economy and adds to our rising welfare benefits bill. Most of all, it is damaging for individuals themselves [if they are] no longer productive, independent or able to support themselves or their families.
“If employees with developing health problems can be seen by occupational health (OH) professionals before they go off sick, everyone wins. A key way to do this is for OH teams to become strategic partners – their organisation’s health right-hand, as it were – proactively managing and preventing risk. OH professionals should also work with, advise and guide organisations at board and executive level.
“A reimagining of workplace health is needed and work expertise of OH professionals can be the transformational step-change we need,” he concludes.
The Society of Occupational Medicine is for all healthcare professionals working in or with an interest in occupational health (OH). It is concerned with the protection of the health of people in the workplace and the prevention of occupational injuries and disease. The Society stimulates interest and research in OH and works with government, the healthcare community, health charities and other bodies to promote a healthier workforce. Providing continued professional development and education for those working in OH, it is a forum for the exchange of ideas and best practice. Visit www.som.org.uk for more information.
References:
1. ‘Health and Wellbeing at Work’, September 2025, CIPD and Simply health, https://www.cipd.org/uk/knowledge/reports/health-well-being-work/#key-findings
2. ‘Understanding the provision of occupational health and work-related musculoskeletal services’, Department for Work and Pensions and Department of Health and Social Care, May 2020, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/understanding-the-provision-of-occupational-health-and-work-related-musculoskeletal-services/full-report-understanding-the-provision-of-occupational-health-and-work-related-musculoskeletal-services
