The Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB) have a developed a Health and Wellbeing Index (HWI) to calculate health and wellbeing risks to employees.
The HWI will allow rail companies to assess how employees’ health compares to other safety considerations.
The HWI will also allow companies to see how they can improve quality of life at work.
Health and wellbeing risks can include fatigue, stress, mental health, musculoskeletal disorders, hand arm vibration syndrome, respiratory conditions and hearing loss.
These risks can all affect an employees’ wellbeing as well as the organisation’s ability to function.
Ali Chegini, RSSB’s Director of System Safety and Health believes the HWI will boost morale in the workforce and help maximise profits.
Mr Chegini said: “There has been no other known successful attempt to build a composite metric to measure health and wellbeing.
“I commend it to our members.
“It could offer a double win of improved quality of life, a healthier and happier workforce, and all while reducing unnecessary costs.”
Martin Frobisher, Group Director of Safety, Technical and Engineering at Network Rail and RRSB Board Member said: “Network Rail is delighted with the HWI initiative.
“It is an excellent piece of work and has really helped us to understand and prioritise health and wellbeing issues.
“We are now routinely using the index for our executive safety reviews, and it is helping us prioritise improvements in a more effective and targeted way.
“I would thoroughly recommend that other businesses adopt this measure.”
Stuart Webster-Spriggs, HSQES Director at VolkerRail Group commented on how the HWI will help the rail industry moving forward.
Mr Webster-Spriggs said: “This is a ground-breaking piece of work which will really tackle the issues of reporting, measuring and benchmarking health and wellbeing metrics.
“[It will] determine ‘what good looks like’ in the rail sector.”
The pilot version of the HWI tool is now available for RSSB members to use.
