UK: The Rail Safety & Standards Board has developed a rail-specific Health & Wellbeing Index which is designed to enable organisations to assess health-based investment decisions by calculating the impact of risks such as fatigue, stress, mental health, musculoskeletal disorders, hand arm vibration syndrome, respiratory conditions and hearing loss.
The HWI works in a similar way to the Fatalities & Weighted Injuries measure used in safety analysis and decision making.
‘The rail industry is leading the way with this kind of approach’, said Ali Chegini, RSSB’s Director of System Safety & Health, on September 20. ‘There has been no other known successful attempt to build a composite metric to measure health and wellbeing, least of all one that has the potential be used to directly compare health and safety. I commend it to our members, it could offer a double win of improved quality of life, a healthier and happier workforce, and all while reducing unnecessary costs.’
Martin Frobisher, Group Director Safety, Technical & Engineering at Network Rail, said ‘we are now routinely using the index for our executive safety reviews, and it is helping us prioritise improvements in a more effective and targeted way.’
