A step-by-step guide to your occupational health journey

1. Referral

To be referred to Occupational Health, a Welfare Officer or the Support Line will complete a referral which will be discussed with you so that you are aware of the referral.

You will be asked to provide as much detail as possible in the referral, including your job role and any previous absence history. This helps to ensure that our Occupational Health Practitioners have all the background information to hand at the consultation and enables the clinician to balance your needs with the needs of your employer.

2. Triage

Upon receipt of a referral our Occupational Health Advisors will read through the information provided to ensure we have understood what is being asked and why. In most cases, the consultation will be a telephone or video call with an Occupational Health Advisor.

3. Making an appointment

In order to ensure that we arrange an appointment date and time that is suitable for you, our administration team will normally contact you to ensure we can agree a mutually convenient date and time. Calls will come from an 01327 number. If we are unable to contact you an appointment will be allocated by our administration team and confirmed by email. You may need to ring us back to re-arrange if not convenient.

Once the appointment is made it will usually be confirmed to you by email, you will also get text message reminders. You will be provided with the details of the date and time of your appointment.

If, for any reason, you are unable to attend your appointment please call your Welfare Officer as soon as possible to rearrange your appointment. If you have been advised that the consultation is going to take place by video or telephone call, please ensure that you have organised a quiet and comfortable location for the date and time of the appointment. This will allow a confidential discussion.

4. Attending the appointment

• At your consultation the clinician will introduce themselves and check to see if you have discussed the referral with your manager and gain verbal consent for the appointment to continue. The Occupational Health Team are required to be fastidiously impartial.
• During the appointment the clinician will guide you through the assessment, keeping the focus on functional capacity in relation to the impact of work on health and health on work whilst identifying and finding solutions to any barriers that may be preventing you from returning to work.
• The clinician will directly discuss the specific questions that you or your manager may have asked. TP Health’s clinicians use a set of evidence-based tools to undertake assessments, which are particularly beneficial for musculoskeletal, mental health and planned surgery referrals.
• At the end of the consultation the clinician will summarise the content of the report that will be written. At this point you should raise any errors, misunderstandings or corrections so they can be discussed with the clinician ensuring the report is as accurate as possible.
• The clinician will finally gain your consent to release the report. Please be aware that we can only make changes to spelling/grammar and factual inaccuracies. We cannot amend our clinical opinion. The appointment will take approximately 30 minutes.

5. The report

The report will be a summarisation of what the clinician regards as the pertinent information you/your manager requires. The clinical information will be limited, and it will not be a verbatim account of the assessment. The report will cover the below points, as required, and answer any specific questions:

1. Advice on the employee’s current health status

2. The prognosis for the condition

3. The likely return to work date or return to full duties date

4. Advice on the current functional ability of the employee

5. Advice on any work restrictions or adaptations and whether this is likely to be short term, long term or permanent

6. A specific rehabilitation/return to work plan with clear time-frames

7. Advice on disability in accordance with relevant UK Legislation (Equality Act, 2010)

Final Step

How to get occupational health support

You can self-refer in the following ways:

• contacting Racing Welfare’s Suport Line on 0800 6300 443
• contacting your local Welfare Officer
• speaking to your employer or GP who can refer you with your consent

When you refer you will be asked some questions, to confirm some basic information in order to verify your identity and take your details. Your consent will also be obtained to take part in the assessment and for your personal information to be processed for that purpose. Any referred treatment will be provided free of charge.