Guest blog by Amanda Hinkley This year is my 40th anniversary in nursing with a 35-year career in occupational health (OH) in manufacturing, retail, aviation, telecommunications, police, NHS and Public Health England (now UK Health Security Agency, UKHSA). I joined Public Health England as an OH…
Guest blog by Maria Paviour, Occupational Psychologist I enjoyed attending the recent Policy Liaison Group for Workplace Wellbeing Roundtable on the Keep Britain Working review, chaired by Gethin Nadin with an esteemed group of people in the room, including Professor Dame Carol Black. The…
Guest blog by Maureen Makanza RN, BSc (Hons), PgDip, SCPHN (OH) My grandmother worked in nursing, and she poured into me a deep sense of care, compassion, and attentiveness to the emotional needs of others. Those values became the foundation of everything that followed. When the opportunity arose to…
Guest blog by Liz Eades, BSc (Hons) RGN SCPHN (OH) CMIOSH When I began my nurse training in 1974, I had no long-term career plans. Nursing for me was something I wanted to do, I guess a calling. I enjoyed the fast pace of A&E but then took my first occupational health (OH) job, in retail, Debenhams…
Guest blog by Dr Cameron Black Our recent survey of UK occupational health (OH) professionals found that 60% have experimented with AI tools mainly for documentation, research, and administration. But only 12% use AI in clinical decision-making. The barriers are not technical, they are human: data…
Guest blog by Angela Steel and Professor Gail Kinman Workplace wellbeing is receiving more attention and investment than ever before, yet many organisations still struggle to embed it in a meaningful and sustainable way. Occupational health (OH) professionals often sit at the intersection between…
Guest blog by Dr Vandita Upadhyaya-Kissoon and Janet O'Neill The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is Britain’s national regulator for workplace health and safety, helping people live safer and healthier working lives. Their 10-year strategy reflects HSE’s role of protecting people and places…
Guest blog by Janet O'Neill The recently published feasibility study paper Feasibility Study: Establishing a National Dataset of Occupational Health Assessments (McElvenny, D et al, 2026) should be on every clinician’s radar. Occupational health (OH) in the UK is at a pivotal moment. Despite decades…
Guest blog by Amy McKeown, Workplace Health Strategy Consultant The RSM and SOM conference, Women’s health at work: Policy, progress and public perception, took place in May at a significant moment for women’s health policy and workplace practice. Designed primarily for occupational health…
Guest blog by Dr Lara Shemtob I caught up with SOM President Prof Neil Greenberg at the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine conference in Chicago in April. We compared notes on learning points from the conference, and our conversation turned to what UK occupational health has…
By Dr Shriti Pattani OBE, SOM Past President I never set out to be a leader. In fact, when I was first asked to speak at a leadership event, my instinctive response was: “But I don’t have any formal leadership qualifications.” The reply I got back stayed with me: “You have several leadership roles…
By Amanda Hinkley, FOHN Chair In 2025, FOHN and SOM entered into a collaborative strategic partnership with the aim to integrate their approaches to workplace health and wellbeing and support the multiprofessional occupational health (OH) workforce. Twelve months on, I am proud of the progress we…