Information about your management referral appointment

Why a manager might refer you

A management referral to Occupational Health is made to ask us to provide an opinion and advice to support your health at work. The Oh Occupational Health and Wellbeing (Oh) professional’s role is to look at the effect that work may be having on your health, and/or the effect that your health may be having on your work.

There can be a number of reasons why you might be referred, such as:

• A prolonged period of absence due to illness
• Recurrent short periods of sickness absence
• Concerns about health affecting your work or performance (where there are health implications), or about your work impacting on your health
• Involvement in an incident at work that has resulted in injury or ill health
• There are difficulties associated with a return to work e.g. following a serious illness or injury or due to a disability

The management referral process

Your manager, or the person making the referral, should have discussed the reason for referral with you and shared a copy of your referral with you. The referral form will have outlined the reasons for referral, and the questions they would like us to address within the oh consultation. If this is not the case, please contact your line manager or HR contact.

Once we have received and processed the referral our administrative team will contact you to offer you an appointment. We will send out reminders prior to appointment via text and email, so it is important that you ensure we have the correct contact details for you.

The appointment

Your appointment may be conducted face to face, via video consultation or over the telephone. The Occupational Health and Wellbeing (Oh) service is committed to providing an inclusive and accessible service for all. If you require any support to attend appointments, or would find a different type of consultation more suitable, please do contact us to discuss this further either by phone 01223 216767 or email add-tr.ohhelpline@nhs.net.

For video and telephone appointments it is essential that you are in a private, quiet space at the time of the appointment to enable the consultation to go ahead. If you do not answer the appointment call the clinician will try again up to three times during the appointment slot. If you are unable to attend your appointment or running late please do let the Oh team know.

Initial appointments may take up to an hour so please ensure you are available for the entire appointment slot, and be aware if you are late by 15 minutes or more the clinician may not be able to complete the appointment and this will have to be rescheduled. There is a very high level of demand for Oh appointments so this could mean a significant delay before a new appointment can be offered.

The appointment is completely confidential and may be with an Oh nurse or doctor. After introductions they will check your understanding of the referral process and explain their role.

Whilst they will be primarily interested in any ongoing health problems and their impact on work (or vice-versa) you will normally be asked other background questions such as your past medical history and social circumstances. This will enable them to gain an overall view of your health and wellbeing and any other factors that might influence your medical fitness for work.

If you do not understand any of the questions posed or the reason for asking them, please ask for clarification.

At the end of the consultation the Oh clinician will discuss any adjustments or support they think could be beneficial for you, and will summarise what information they will include in the report to your manager. This information will include their answers to the questions posed in the referral from your manager.

How we process our report

Your manager, or the person who made the referral, will expect a report from oh following your appointment with us. This report will focus on answering the questions they asked on the referral form and providing information the manager should consider related to your work – for example any adjustments and support that oh suggests. We will not share any medical information (e.g. your diagnosis) without your consent.

The content of the report will be discussed with you by the oh nurse or doctor during your appointment, and if you are happy with this you can provide verbal consent for the report to be sent to your manager. We will send you a copy of this report at the time it is sent to your manager.

In some cases individuals would like to see a copy of the report prior to this being shared with the manager – in this scenario we will send a copy of the report via email and request you to confirm your consent to share this. Please be aware that this can add a delay to the process.

You have the right to withdraw your consent prior to the report being sent. If you ask us not to share the report with the referring manager we will inform them that you have declined for a report to be made available.

Next steps

At the end of your appointment the clinician will discuss and agree next steps with you. For many individuals there will not be any requirement for a further appointment with oh, but your clinician may recommend or refer you for further support from another service such as Physiotherapy or the NHS staff mental health service.

In some cases we will offer a follow up appointment with oh to assess the impact of the steps that have been taken to help you and your employer, and explore if any further support or adjustments are needed.

Confidentiality

The service provided by Oh Occupational Health and Wellbeing is subject to medical confidentiality.  All the staff at oh understand their responsibilities to maintain confidentiality, and clinical staff work within their professional codes of conduct.

Occasionally the nurse or doctor you see may wish to obtain further medical information from your GP or specialist. This would only be if it will assist in answering the questions asked on your referral and staff will explain what information they plan to seek from your doctor or other healthcare provider. Information will only be requested with your explicit consent and you would be asked to complete a consent form that outlines your rights under the ‘Access to Medical Reports Act’ 1988.

We will not share your clinical notes or any medical records with your manager, only the management referral report will be shared with your consent. This report should be treated by the recipient as sensitive personal data in respect of the Data Protection Act 2018.  Confidential medical information may only be disclosed if:

• the individual consents
• there is an over-riding duty of care to a third party, or
• there is an order to disclose information by a court of law

For information on how we store and use your information and health records, and how you can request access please see the information booklet available for download on our website. Just visit: www.ohwellbeing.com/contact-us/

Further information

Further information regarding the our service's including management referral can be found on our website page Making a referral (opens in a new tab).