Business Health Matters

The 'Business Health Matters' project is focussed on the 'Maintaining Health at Work' theme of the Healthy Ageing Challenge Framework. The project aims to develop an effective programme of support to individuals of working age and their employers in Lancashire, to enable them to remain healthy or regain health and so sustain employment and improve productivity. As part of the development, the project will road test a model that can be either franchised in other areas of the UK, or can be offered as an exemplar that other areas can adopt, with the opportunity to provide consultancy services to new adopters.

The key features of the project are further development, research and testing of a screening tool already developed by University of Central Lancashire (UCLAN) that will enable leisure services staff to administer screening for working age people which will assess their physical and mental health. This screening tool will then be coupled will a suite of mental and physical health interventions that can support working aged individuals to remain healthy or regain health and so sustain employment and improve productivity, working with service providers. The project will look to facilitate the application of this approach at a scale not seen previously either in Lancashire or elsewhere.

As part of the project we will look to mobilise funding available from Anchor Institutions to support the development and implementation of the programme. Work will be underpinned by the research of The Work Foundation on good employment practice in companies supporting healthy ageing in their workforce. The project will also look to influence policy and use Anchor institutions leverage in their procurement to make good employment practice in this field a requirement for their supply chains.

The project involves collaboration between public sector, social enterprises, academic institutions and ultimately (Stage 2) private sector to address national priorities of healthy ageing, self-care, wellbeing, sustainable employment and productivity. The broader significance of the project is that it has the potential to reduce demand on GP services, engage a new workforce in delivery of health-related services at a time of shortages of trained health staff term, reduce demand on high cost acute services and increase productivity of the workforce and so profitability of companies/economy.