Fitness to attend workplace hearings

Occupational health assessments in sickness reviews and disciplinary proceedings

Summary:

OH professionals will sometimes be asked to provide advice on an employee’s fitness to attend a disciplinary or other employment hearing. Consultant psychiatrist Professor Marios Adamou examines the clinical, legal and ethical factors that OH professionals need to consider when making their recommendations.

Occupational health (OH) professionals will be well-versed in providing employers with advice on a worker’s fitness for work. There are occasions, however, when they will be tasked with assessing whether a worker is fit to attend a disciplinary, capability or other employment hearing. The task must be approached with care, because fitness to attend a hearing is not the same as fitness for work, and the OH professional should also be mindful that a disciplinary process itself could risk worsening an …

 

 

Professor Marios Adamou OBE is a consultant psychiatrist in neurodevelopmental psychiatry at South West Yorkshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust..

 

Author: Adamou M

Tags fitness for work sleep

Occupational Health at Work February/March 2026 (vol. 22/5) pp17-24

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