Occupational Health
Stress in the Workplace
People's mental and physical health can be adversely affected by aspects of their working environment, which produce feelings of anxiety and sometimes acute distress. Factors such as long hours, workload, uncertain expectations and very significantly, lack of control over work tasks, can lead to intense feelings of being unable to cope with such pressures and if prolonged this can lead to short as well as longer term damage to physical as well as mental health. But like many other kinds of contemporary health and safety issue (e.g. noise ' manual handling injury and even noise induced hearing loss) the causes of stress in individuals are not wholly occupational in origin but are affected also by what is happening to them outside work (marriage problems, bereavement, money worries and so on). Also, like many other occupational health issues (e.g. respiratory sensitisation) there is a wide range of individual susceptibility to stress and its short, medium and long-term effects.
The government reports that nearly one in three of Europe's workers, more than 40 million people, report that they are affected by stress at work.
As a contribution to the European Week for Safety & Health at Work 2002, RoSPA published an Alert on the issue of Stress and its effects on safety.
Here you can find more information on courses and products for managers and employees.
|
RoSPA is a registered charity: Registered Charity No: 207823 Patron: Her Majesty the Queen RoSPA Head Office: Edgbaston Park, 353 Bristol Road, Edgbaston, Birmingham B5 7ST, UK |
 |