Integrated Occupational Health (OH) and Staff Health & Wellbeing Services

Description

The service plays an essential role in supporting staff through organisational change, enabling colleagues to perform at their highest potential, and contributing to overall operational efficiency by equipping managers to proactively manage attendance. It also leads the development of a comprehensive health and wellbeing framework that ensures staff feel engaged, supported, and provided with meaningful opportunities to enhance their health and wellbeing at work. As part of its core function, the service manages employee referrals effectively, delivering a wide range of interventions including attendance at case conferences, return to work advice-such as following infectious illness-and clinical management of blood borne virus exposures. The service is delivered by a highly competent multidisciplinary team of health professionals and is professionally led by the Head of Occupational Health and Workforce Wellbeing, who oversees the implementation of the OH and Wellbeing Policy and provides assurance on the professional standards of the service. This leadership role reports to the Deputy Chief People Officer, and the service forms an integral part of the Workforce Directorate. The proposed approach supports: • Delivery of the NHS Growing Occupational Health and Wellbeing Together Strategy 2023-2028 • The NHS Long Term Workforce Plan and 2026/27 medium term planning guidance • Recovery and improvement priorities for a Segment 3 Trust operating in a financially challenged, turnaround ICS • Place based, preventative, and system led workforce wellbeing as an anchor institution WUTH's Occupational Health service has been SEQOHS accredited since 2016, with the most recent reaccreditation on 02/02/2026. This is the nationally required accreditation for NHS OH services. • The service is delivered in accordance with: o NHS Elements of Health & Wellbeing Framework (2022) o Department of Health "Green Book" 2020 vaccination guidelines o NICE guidelines • WUTH holds all required OH accreditations (SEQOHS), meets statutory data and governance standards, and is compliant with all national frameworks confirming suitability to deliver the OH service. Lot 1: WUTH deliver Occupational health and Wellbeing in Three pillars: Pillar One : delivers a population health based, prevention led wellbeing strategy for the WUTH workforce, treating staff as a defined population with specific health needs and inequalities. This model introduces dedicated resource to identify workforce health risks, analyse data such as NSS results, sickness absence patterns, and local health inequalities, and design targeted wellbeing interventions informed by both internal assets and wider community resources. Pillar One leads trust wide wellbeing campaigns, coordinates large scale programmes including Well WUTH, TRiM, Mental Health First Aid and the Wellbeing Champions network and drives proactive initiatives aimed at improving resilience, reducing sickness absence, and strengthening uptake of mental health support pathways such as the EAP. A core feature of this model is its community integrated approach: working directly with local charities, voluntary-sector organisations, neighbourhood groups and social programmes to improve staff access to community based wellbeing resources that address the wider social determinants of health. This approach aligns directly with the organisation's commitment to community rooted wellbeing, preventative services aligned to workforce need, and strong integration with local authority and third sector partners, enabling a more accessible, place based offer for all staff across NHS sites. Pillar Two: delivers WUTH's core clinical Occupational Health (OH) provision, offering a comprehensive range of services that support the health, safety and fitness for work of the Trust's workforce. This includes employment screening, vaccination and immunisation, health screening and surveillance, management referrals, sickness absence advice, return to work guidance, recommendations for reasonable adjustments, post exposure incident management, workplace assessments, general occupational health advice, and direct support for infection prevention, contact tracing, and outbreak management. WUTH provides a nurse led, multidisciplinary clinical OH service, bringing together Consultant Occupational Health Physicians, OH Physicians with specialist skills including Blood Borne Virus management, and experienced OH Specialist Nurses. The department delivers a fully NHS aligned vaccination and immunisation service with direct access to NHS laboratories, Infection Prevention and Control teams, and Trust wide outbreak management functions, ensuring seamless pathways, high clinical standards, and rapid, safe response to workplace health risks. Pillar Three: delivers WUTH's fully NICE compliant stepped psychological care model, offering in house clinical provision at every stage to support staff mental health needs. Step 1 focuses on proactive mental wellbeing, with psychotherapist led workshops on stress, resilience, trauma awareness and coping skills, alongside team based psychoeducation following significant events such as child deaths or serious incidents. Step 2 provides BACP registered counselling through Health Assured, with WUTH being the highest regional user of the service. Step 3 offers Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) delivered by a Band 7 CBT Therapist, providing evidence based treatment for moderate to severe anxiety, depression and OCD in line with NICE guidance. Step 4 delivers specialist trauma therapy, including EMDR, led by a Band 8b Senior Psychotherapist for complex psychological presentations and post incident support for staff exposed to traumatic events. Alongside these stepped interventions, WUTH provides workforce wide psychological support through thematic workshops, critical incident debriefing and targeted team-based interventions following adverse events, ensuring comprehensive and accessible psychological care across the organisation. Governance & Compliance • Strong governance reporting into: o Clinical Advisory Group o Infection Prevention Control Committee o Health & Safety Committee o Workforce Steering Board • The service complies with: o Data Protection Act 2018 o UK GDPR o DTAC (Digital Technology Assessment Criteria) o DPIA requirements