Occupational health - fit for work report

If an employee makes you aware of a medical condition, you need to ensure that their job doesn’t aggravate it. You can manage the process with our document.

Legal position

The Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 imposes an explicit duty on employers to ensure the health, safety and welfare of their employees. However, many assume that this stops at accident prevention. If staff are suffering from ill health, e.g. a bad back, the employer must take reasonable steps to ensure that their work duties don’t make it worse.

Manage the situation

If staff tell you that they have a medical condition that could be directly affected by their work, use our Occupational Health - Fit for Work Report. Running through this document will help both parties to understand what actions are required.

What’s covered?

It starts with the following statement: “This report should be completed to ensure that no member of staff is asked to complete tasks which may aggravate an existing medical condition or injury. At no point should confidential medical information be requested.”

Note. This is to show that you are completing this process for their benefit. Of course it’s in your interests as well as it keeps your staff at work and productive; plus, it minimises the likelihood of you being held responsible for their medical condition later.

Simple questions

The next part of the document asks questions for you to find out more about the injury and what actions are required. At the end, there are boxes provided for you to identify what steps are to be taken. Finally, there is space for both parties to sign the form.