Expanding the Focus of Occupational Safety and Health: Lessons from a Series of Linked Scientific Meetings

Abstract

There is widespread recognition that the world of work is changing, and agreement is growing that the occupational safety and health (OSH) field must change to contribute to the protection of workers now and in the future. Discourse on the evolution of OSH has been active for many decades, but formalized support of an expanded focus for OSH has greatly increased over the past 20 years. Development of approaches such as the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)’s Total Worker Health® concept and the World Health Organization (WHO)’s Healthy Workplace Framework are concrete examples of how OSH can incorporate a new focus with a wider view. In 2019, NIOSH initiated a multi-year effort to explore an expanded focus for OSH. This paper is a report on the outputs of a three-year cooperative agreement between NIOSH and The University of Texas School of Public Health, which led to subject matter expert workshops in 2020 and an international conference of global interest groups in 2021. This article traces the background of these meetings and identifies and assesses the lessons learned. It also reviews ten thematic topics that emerged from the meetings: worker health inequalities; training new OSH professionals; future OSH research and practice; tools to measure well-being of workers; psychosocial hazards and adverse mental health effects; skilling, upskilling and improving job quality; socioeconomic influences; climate change; COVID-19 pandemic influences; and strategic foresight. Cross-cutting these themes is the need for systems and transdisciplinary thinking and operationalization of the concept of well-being to prepare the OSH field for the work of the future.

Preparing the occupational safety and health workforce for future disruptions

“…Though not yet the prevailing approach, there are glimpses of this H3 in the present. Recent recommendations to significantly expand the focus of OSH 40,41 are one current signal of potential long‐term transformation for OSH. This conceptual expansion challenges us to recognize, explore, and address the interactive nature of diverse worker health and well‐being outcomes that are complexly affected by personal, family, occupational, community, and societal risk factors across the entire working life continuum 40 .…”

“…This conceptual expansion challenges us to recognize, explore, and address the interactive nature of diverse worker health and well‐being outcomes that are complexly affected by personal, family, occupational, community, and societal risk factors across the entire working life continuum 40 . This more holistic view of OSH risk factors and outcomes may enhance OSH capacity to prepare for and respond to future disruptions 41 …”

“…40 This more holistic view of OSH risk factors and outcomes may enhance OSH capacity to prepare for and respond to future disruptions. 41 When designing a foresight project, the time-based definitions applied to the near-, mid,-and far term futures are flexible. 36 They are most useful, however, when aligned with relevant planning or business cycles.…”

An Approach to Future Directions for Occupational Health Nursing

“…The coming years will be marked by an ecological and digital transition accompanied by economic and demographic challenges, in addition to the evolution of the working environment toward models based on delocalization, the gig-economy, and digital platforms—realities that are breaking away from other more traditional types of work (European Agency for Safety and Health at Work, 2021; European Commission, 2021). From this perspective, the regulatory framework that defines the professional competencies of this speciality in every country, access to occupational health nursing in companies, and the holistic approach in the care of the working population determines the space that this discipline occupies in the process of improving working conditions but also increasing the quality of life at work (González-Caballero, 2021; Schulte et al, 2022).…”

“…How do we design of new lines of research? And, finally, how do we translate new evidence into company policies (Schulte et al, 2019(Schulte et al, , 2022. It is incumbent on the speciality to question the professional adaptation to this new socio-occupational reality and to analyze the needs and expectations of organizations and their members to provide expert and quality care (European Trade Union Institute [ETUI], 2017; Schulte et al, 2019).…”