How Employee Health and OccMed Can Manage Flu Vaccine Reporting During COVID

How Employee Health and OccMed Can Manage Flu Vaccine Reporting During COVID

Organizing year-round immunization programs for healthcare workers (HCWs) is already challenging for Employee Health (EH) departments and Occupational Medicine (OccMed) clinics. But ensuring that HCWs receive their annual flu shot is crucial to the health of both practitioners and their patients, and it’s doubly challenging during the current pandemic when EH and OccMed employees are…

Managing Back Pain in Employee Health and OccMed

Managing Back Pain in Employee Health and OccMed

Back pain is the most common work-related musculoskeletal disorder related to absenteeism in every occupation.1 Low back pain (LBP) is the most common type of back pain, affecting 1 in 4  American workers.2 It costs the nation $100 billion annually.3 Recent research suggests that current health and safety measures are insufficient when dealing with workplace…

Quantifying Your Economic Impact as an OccMed Medical Assistant

Quantifying Your Economic Impact as an OccMed Medical Assistant

Occupational Medicine (OccMed) medical assistants/nurses are in a leadership position, whether they work on-site for a business or at an independent or hospital-owned clinic. By working directly with patients and their employers, OccMed nurses play an integral role in keeping businesses operational.   Yet, amid long-standing nursing shortages1 and budget cuts, OccMed medical assistants/nurses sometimes…

History of Infectious Disease Outbreaks in EH/OM World

History of Infectious Disease Outbreaks in EH/OM World

Healthcare workers (HCWs) have a high risk of coming into contact with infectious agents and bloodborne pathogens (BBP), including human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), hepatitis B, hepatitis C, influenza (whether it’s seasonal flu or an outbreak of swine or avian flu), methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), measles, and now, SARS-CoV-2 (which causes COVID-19). Because U.S. hospitals admit…

Continuing Education for OccMed Safety Managers

Continuing Education for OccMed Safety Managers

Occupational Medicine (OccMed) safety managers face the challenge of supporting an organization’s endeavors while ensuring that employee activity is safe, healthy, and consistent with regulatory requirements. It’s also necessary to try and predict what new tasks may become dangerous and enforce new safety standards as we learn more about issues such as ergonomic injuries and…

Don’t Panic! What EH and OM Employers Need to Know About Monkeypox

Don’t Panic! What EH and OM Employers Need to Know About Monkeypox

Amid COVID precautions, employers are now facing the challenge of reducing the new public health threat posed by the monkeypox virus (MPV). As of October 4, 2022, the Centers for Disease Control recorded 26,194 cases of monkeypox in the U.S.1 Because this is the first time MPV has caused widespread illness, it can be difficult…

How Occupational Health Executives Can Plan for the Future of Work

How Occupational Health Executives Can Plan for the Future of Work

Even before the COVID pandemic, the workforce was changing – more people were working remotely, the workforce was aging, and employee demographics were becoming more diverse.1 In light of new challenges to occupational health and the growing importance of employee wellbeing in addition to safety, Occupational Medicine (OccMed) executives will likely need to rethink how…

How to Encourage Employee Participation in Preventive Health Services

How to Encourage Employee Participation in Preventive Health Services

Preventive care is crucial to long-term health and can help reduce employees’ need for medical services provided by their employer-sponsored health plans or Occupational Medicine (OccMed) clinics. Even before the pandemic, employees used few – if any – employer-sponsored medical services each year.1 As a result, employers saw a reduction in claims in 2020 and…

Net Health Webinar Talks About Occupational Health Standardization Do’s and Don’ts

Net Health Webinar Talks About Occupational Health Standardization Do’s and Don’ts

On September 9, 2022, Net Health co-sponsored a webinar with Occupational Health & Safety (OHS) titled “Process Standardization Do’s and Don’ts.” The webinar covered: The definition of process standardization The types of Standard Operating Policies and Procedures (SOPs) Reasons companies (from healthcare to retail and manufacturing) should create SOPs Steps for writing an SOP What…

5 Ways Health and Safety Managers Can Help Prevent the Most Common Injuries in Retail and Manufacturing

5 Ways Health and Safety Managers Can Help Prevent the Most Common Injuries in Retail and Manufacturing

Musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs), or “ergonomic injuries,” are the most common type of injury in the retail and manufacturing (R&M) sectors.1 These injuries affect muscles, nerves, tendons, joints, cartilage, and spinal discs and are typically caused by overexertion while lifting, pushing, pulling, and other actions required to move objects.2 In retail, the incidence rate for MSDs was 34.8%,…