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O
n March 12, 2009, 17 people were killed after a helicopter crashed off
the coast of Newfoundland. Commissioner Robert Wells was tasked with
heading up the Offshore Helicopter Safety Inquiry to investigate the inci-
dent and make recommendations to prevent future similar occurrences.
In his report, Wells said the lone survivor, Robert Decker, likely lived through
the accident due to a number of factors, including his fitness level.
"(He) was a tall, lean fella and they think that because other people may have
been more dense, in particular men — we store weight around our midsection
— it could have compressed their kidneys and caused their blood pressure to
go so high that they passed out," says Mike Wahl, senior director of wellness
strategy and solutions, Horizon Occupational Health Solutions and the Medisys
Health Group. "The fitness of workers was one of the reasons they may not have
been able to get out."
Although occupational health and safety encompasses the word "health,"
all too often the health promotion activities in an organization are categorized
as "wellness" and operate separately from the OHS department. Research has
emerged in recent years about the impact health has on safety and the organiza-
tion as a whole, from reduced injuries to increased productivity and considerable
financial savings. But in order to reap these rewards, experts say employers need to
marry their OHS and wellness programming.
There are a variety of ways health impacts safety, including obesity. Wahl's
research has found that soft tissue injuries drop in concordance with a decrease
in waist circumference for workers. Once they hit the average waist circumference
or drop below that threshold, they essentially become protected against injury,
experiencing even less injuries as a result, he says.
His research has also found that a man with a waist circumference of more than
42 inches and a woman with a waist circumference of more than 38 inches will cost
six times as much over the course of their employment when it comes to disability
and preventable health costs than someone who is below that threshold.
Holistic
health
and safety
OHS and human resources
need to come closer together
if they want to improve health
outcomes for workers
By Amanda Silliker