Safety and Health at Work Vol. 13 Supplement 2022
Occupational Health e Adding Value to Business
Dublin Core
Title
Safety and Health at Work Vol. 13 Supplement 2022
Occupational Health e Adding Value to Business
Occupational Health e Adding Value to Business
Subject
Occupational Health , Adding Value to Business
Description
The well-known saying is “Prevention is Better than Cure”. In real life, however, a doctor is expected to carry out curative services most of the time! As a result of this practice, medical services in industries also tend to focus on curative services. Occupational Health Services (OHS) in industries should ideally provide preventive health services to prevent occupational diseases, many of which do not have antidotes or curative treatment. The concept of preventive health is often missing in developing economies and many, including some medical professionals, believe that doctors are supposed to come into the picture only after disease has set in. The approach to health care is often “reactive” rather than “proactive”.
Medical professionals are frequently employed in industry merely to fulfill statutory obligations and are not perceived to be adding value to business. They are viewed as a welfare activity with stress on curative services and managing accidents and are therefore considered to be a “Cost Centre”. It is rather very unfortunate that the very important human resources are not as well monitored as the other resources like money, material and machinery. Medical professionals who joined industry also often believed that their job was curative and hence did not lay stress on occupational health.
They did not venture to convince the management to introduce a
occupational health program. They were content to provide emergency and curative service to the employees. The long latent period of occupational diseases, the apprehension of industrial relation problems if employee became aware of hazards and fear of penalties on reporting occupational hazards were also responsible for Occupational Health not getting the importance it deserved.
The author was working as the Corporate Medical Advisor responsible for occupational health and medical services to the Reliance Group of Industries, the largest private sector organization in India. This presentation describes the initiatives taken to implement Occupational Health Programs at manufacturing sites after creating Awareness on the subject and empowering them to come up with solutions to mitigate Occupational Hazards. This gave in an enterprise wide fillip to Occupational Health which proved to be beneficial to the employees as well as the organization. The program named CASH (Change Agents for Safety & Health) has been widely accepted by the workers and the managers and has sustained for nearly two decades. It has become an integral part of the business. The key to the success of the program was the understanding by the management and the workmen that proactive
measures to prevent exposure to Occupational Health hazards go a long way in being healthy and productive thereby adding Value to Business.
Medical professionals are frequently employed in industry merely to fulfill statutory obligations and are not perceived to be adding value to business. They are viewed as a welfare activity with stress on curative services and managing accidents and are therefore considered to be a “Cost Centre”. It is rather very unfortunate that the very important human resources are not as well monitored as the other resources like money, material and machinery. Medical professionals who joined industry also often believed that their job was curative and hence did not lay stress on occupational health.
They did not venture to convince the management to introduce a
occupational health program. They were content to provide emergency and curative service to the employees. The long latent period of occupational diseases, the apprehension of industrial relation problems if employee became aware of hazards and fear of penalties on reporting occupational hazards were also responsible for Occupational Health not getting the importance it deserved.
The author was working as the Corporate Medical Advisor responsible for occupational health and medical services to the Reliance Group of Industries, the largest private sector organization in India. This presentation describes the initiatives taken to implement Occupational Health Programs at manufacturing sites after creating Awareness on the subject and empowering them to come up with solutions to mitigate Occupational Hazards. This gave in an enterprise wide fillip to Occupational Health which proved to be beneficial to the employees as well as the organization. The program named CASH (Change Agents for Safety & Health) has been widely accepted by the workers and the managers and has sustained for nearly two decades. It has become an integral part of the business. The key to the success of the program was the understanding by the management and the workmen that proactive
measures to prevent exposure to Occupational Health hazards go a long way in being healthy and productive thereby adding Value to Business.
Creator
Shrinivas Shanbhag
Publisher
Elsevier Korea LLC
Date
January 2022
Contributor
Sri Wahyuni
Format
PDF
Language
English
Type
Text
Coverage
Safety and Health at Work Vol. 13 Supplement 2022
Files
Citation
Shrinivas Shanbhag, “Safety and Health at Work Vol. 13 Supplement 2022
Occupational Health e Adding Value to Business,” Repository Horizon University Indonesia, accessed April 27, 2025, https://repository.horizon.ac.id/items/show/2504.
Occupational Health e Adding Value to Business,” Repository Horizon University Indonesia, accessed April 27, 2025, https://repository.horizon.ac.id/items/show/2504.