Although most SPHM programs include technology, policies and procedures, and training, many programs fail to recognize the value of integrating ways healthcare workers can join their efforts with those of employers to develop a strategy for reasonable accommodation in the presence of injury. Eric Race, founder and CEO of Atlas Lift Tech, explains that occupational health coordinators are embracing SPHM efforts because they now are confident they are releasing post-injury workers into a safe working environment (Race, 2013). One of the most important factors in recovering from an occupational injury and controlling worker’s compensation costs is facilitation of a meaningful and safe return to work effort. The healthcare worker benefits by being productive and receiving a salary, and the employer benefits by having an experienced healthcare worker back on the job. However, a safe return to work environment is essential.

Planning for healthcare worker recovery and return to work is an important component of a SPHM program. A first step for such an action plan is acknowledging the value of a partnership between the employer and the healthcare worker. Consider Madge, a 32-year-old nursing assistant who had worked at the same home care agency for the past 17 years. Madge had always manually handled healthcare recipients at home. While Madge was away with her shoulder injury, the agency instituted an organization-wide SPHM program that coincided with the programs at the local acute and long-term care facilities. As part of the program, Madge was trained on the principles of SPHM before she was released back to work. She served as a champion for the SPHM program.

Healthcare workers such as Madge need appropriate medical care/intervention and a safe return to work. If the provider restricts the work the healthcare worker can perform, the healthcare worker can expect to be assigned modified or alternate work duties designed to facilitate a return to work. Modified work is often described as the injured healthcare worker’s regular job that is modi fied to accommodate work restrictions. Alternative work is considered to be a temporary work assignment when the worker is unable to return to his or her regular job. Transitional work should be work that the healthcare worker can perform with an acceptable degree of efficiency without endangering his or her health and safety or that of others. Transitional work allows an injured healthcare worker to remain safely in the workplace, but in a modified or alternate work capacity until she or he has recovered sufficiently to return to her or his regular job.

For this partnership to work, employers and healthcare workers must take on certain responsibilities. This is especially true in occupational settings where workers, historically, have been expected to manually lift, turn, and reposition healthcare recipients numerous times throughout the workday. Recognizing SPHM in both reasonable accommodation and the post-injury return to work is a key factor in this partnership.

What follows are selected ideas and insights on strategies to include reasonable accommodation and post-injury return to work processes into a meaningful SPHM program. A collaborative approach to managing the challenge of injury is essential. Ways to create a mutually respectful environment evolve from the partnership that is built between the healthcare worker and the employer. Understanding and managing occupational hazards through thorough ergonomic assessments tailored to the special needs of injured workers is part of
the process. The ideas and insights are organized by the sets and subsets of the standards that are required by any facility: one specific to your organization as an employer, the other to your facility’s interprofessional healthcare workers. This approach recognizes teamwork as a factor inherent in a successful, safe, and healthy occupational environment that addresses the goals of the healthcare worker, healthcare recipient, and healthcare organization.