Guidance offered for improving mental health in workplace

(HealthDay)—Four recommendations for action have been developed for improving mental health in the workplace; the guidance forms the basis for an article published online in the April issue of the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.

Ron Z. Goetzel, Ph.D., from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, and colleagues convened a public health summit and assembled an Advisory Council of experts to offer recommendations for action steps to improve the health and well-being of workers.

The Advisory Council recommended four priority projects. These include developing a “how to” guide for mental health in the workplace, providing advice and guidance to employers, together with metrics that can be used to design, implement, and assess a mental health in the workplace program. Developing a mental health in the workplace scorecard could help employers gauge the extent to which they have implemented best and promising practices and achieved a culture of health and well-being. In addition, a “mental health in the workplace” recognition program should be established to recognize accomplishments of specific businesses in the field of mental health in the workplace. Development of an executive training program focused on mental health in the workplace could further aid businesses and professionals.

“Since most of life is spent in working years, the workplace is an ideal setting for public health-informed initiatives that promote mental and behavioral health and prevent illness,” the authors write. “It is our expectation that the project initiative outlined here will result in measurable improvements in workers’ mental health and well-being.”

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