Routine Medicals for Employees

 What is a Routine Medical Examination?

A routine medical examination is an important part of your company’s risk management and compliance. After you do your baseline medical on all new employees or sites, you need to make sure that there are no changes in the employee’s health over time. A Routine medical should be done yearly to keep track of an employee’s health. A routine medical will be compared to your baseline and any previous routine medicals. This will give you some data to compare. If there are major changes in an employee’s health, a referral can be made for further investigation.

Remember! As with all other medicals, it must always be signed off by a qualified Occupational Health Practitioner.

Practical Example of a Routine Medical Examination

Firstly, let’s say you start working at a site and you begin with a baseline medical. The job continues for more than a year and you conduct routine medicals every year. During the routine medical, it might be determined that an employee has lost a significant amount of weight since the start of the project. The OHS practitioner will try and determine the cause of the weight loss. If the employee did not make any lifestyle changes or intended to lose weight, it could be a sign of serious underlying illness.

Secondly, the OHS practitioner will give the employee a referral letter to visit a clinic. Here further investigation and testing can be done to determine the cause of the weight loss. This can be directly, or indirectly related to the site where the employee performs their duties. If this is the case, drastic measures will have to be put in place to prevent or manage exposure. In some cases, the illness can be completely unrelated to the worker’s working environment but could mean they are not fit for their position anymore due to health constraints. A routine medical will help to make sure that you maintain a healthy workforce and prevent loss as a result of future claims against the company.

Lastly, if you have your routine medicals in place, you can protect the company from future claims. If an employee becomes sick later in life, they can blame the company for their health conditions that may have been caused over time. If you cannot prove that you took reasonable action to prevent health issues, the company may be held liable for the employee’s health. This can potentially be an expensive mistake to make. Remember, something like hearing loss can happen over many years of exposure. You need to have early detection to ensure you take reasonable action.