Good work, good health

Summary:

Gordon Waddell, who has died aged 74, made a huge contribution to modern OH.  The new government should revisit his work.

IT is now accepted that work is generally good for your health and wellbeing, but it was Gordon Waddell, who has died aged 74 (obituary pp.16–17), and his colleague Kim Burton who highlighted that it must be ‘good work’¹. With record numbers of people on zero-hours contracts, over a million people a year suffering a new work-related illness or injury, and Britain’s ‘disability employment gap’ wider than it was in 2010, that proviso is as relevant now as ever.

Building on his earlier research on chronic low back pain², Waddell helped establish the biopsychosocial approach to OH by recognising psychosocial as well as biomedical factors in the management of back pain³

John Ballard, editor

Author: Ballard J

Tags back pain biopsychosocial mesothelioma obituary oh policies

Occupational Health at Work June/July 2017 (vol. 14/1) pp03

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