Stress is the number one cause of employee absenteeism and costs British Industry in excess of £12 billion per year. 28.5 days per year is the average time absent from work for each affected worker and over 66,000 cases of work related heart disease were reported in 2003/4 with stress being cited as the major cause in the majority of cases. Taking work related stress and stress induced heart disease cases together, stress contributes to ill health and time off work in over two thirds of a million workers each year.
The impact of this on companies has been shown to include, increased absenteeism, reduced productivity, poor timekeeping, increased staff turnover, increased customer complaints, increased costs, decreased profits and staff morale, increased litigation and increased ill health of employees.
The Health & Safety Executive states that “Under existing law, employers have a clear duty to ensure their employees’ health. This is a PREVENTATIVE duty.”
Determination of the level of stress in the workplace has always been carried out using questionnaires, these are subjective and often inaccurate and to date, there has been no reliable system available that can accurately and objectively measure the actual levels of stress, or the ability to cope with its effects on the body.
Medicalliance can now offer a unique solution to corporate clients in managing stress and the impact of stress both in terms of the individual and to the company. Through pioneering technology Medicalliance can now offer corporate clients a definitive measure of stress and its effects. By measuring HRV (Heart Rate Variability) as a measure of autonomic nervous system output, physiological and psychological stress levels can be measured along with the ability to cope with stress and stress resilience levels. By implementing an employee audit using this system Medicalliance can also accurately predict employee absenteeism rates and productivity and offer intervention to reduce sickness absenteeism in the workplace.
Impact of stress to the company:
Medicalliance can offer the first non questionnaire stress assessment that can measure both stress and stress reserve in the individual. From the results an accurate prediction of the impact of lost workdays can be calculated for the company and an intervention strategy implemented that will:
Reduce stress
Reduce risk factors of disease
Decrease sickness absenteeism
Increase productivity
To arrange a demonstration of the ANSA stress assessment system please call Medicalliance on 01296 711006