According to a report commissioned in the 90s by the Department of Health, one in seven adults suffers from a psychological disorder. The most common neurosis is a mixed anxiety and depressive disorder, affecting 7.1% of people. The symptoms reported (all indicators of varying degrees of mental illness) were: fatigue, irritability, worry, anxiety, obsessions, depression, sleep problems, lack of concentration, forgetfulness, phobias and unexplained aches or pains brought on by stress. (Source: The Independent, 15/12/1994)

 

 

Staff at the largest local authority in Britain took 895,000 days off sick last year, official figures have shown.
The staggering number was clocked up by Birmingham City Council's 50,000 employees each being off sick for an average of 17.9 days, the equivalent of three and a half working weeks.
That is almost three times as much as workers in the private sector, where the Confederation of British Industry says staff are ill for an average of just 6.7 days a year.
Four departments of the Labour -led council - education, housing, social services and transportation - account for almost three-quarters of Birmingham's total absences.
And long term sickness is on the increase, according to a scrutiny committee inquiry. The number of employees absent for more than four months rose from 234 to 244 in the 12 months to May, 2002.
Absenteeism costs the authority about £61 million a year, the committee said.   Daily mail 1/1/2003


 

 

This article is taken from the Sunday Times, 5th January 2003. 

Civil servants are taking more than 4m days off work per year through illness, according to a report commissioned by the government. The sick days cost taxpayers more than £300m.
The report, slipped out on the day MPs left for their Christmas break, shows bureaucrats each take an average of 9.2 days off sick per year, 13% more than the national average.
The figures show the government has failed to reach a target laid down by Gordon Brown, the chancellor, four years ago to cut civil service absence through sickness by 20% by 2002. Almost one in twenty working days is now lost through sickness.
"Sickness absence continues to be a significant operational and financial burden," says the report. It calculates that sick leave cost the taxpayer £306m in 2001.
The employees most likely to take days off were clerical and managerial  staff in the Royal Parks Agency and the Scottish Public Pensions Agency, where workers accumulated an average of 13.5 sick days off per year.
In the main departments, Northern Ireland Office civil servants took the most sick days while the the Treasury employees, following the lead of workaholic Brown, took the least, just 4.7 days.
The report says "infective and parasitic causes" are responsible for a "noticeable" percentage of absences at the Department for Work and Pensions and the Scottish executive. Aon, the consultants who wrote the report, describe this phenomenon as "interesting" but were unable to explain its causes.
The report's authors were also unable to explain why Home Office staff were more likely to suffer accidents.
Other causes of absence included skin complaints, "congenital anomalies" and "symptoms ill-defined".
Mental illness, much of it thought to be stress related, accounted for more than a fifth of working days lost.

 

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 This article is taken from the March 2003 issue of Occupational Health magazine

Workplace absence rates are at their highest level since 1996, according to the study by the Work Foundation.
Overall absence rates were 4.12 per cent in 2002 - or the equivalent of nine days a year per employee - up from 2.9 per cent in 2001, the study of 400 HR professionals found.  The problem is particularly acute in the public and voluntary sectors, where the absence rate has more than doubled from 2.97 per cent to 7.86 per cent.
The top five reasons given by employees for time off were colds or flu, food poisoning, or stomach upsets, headaches or migraines, stress, emotional or personal problems, and back problems.
Employers believed the most effective methods for maximising attendance were return-to-work interviews, motivation, accurate monitoring, and the training of  line managers. A written absence policy was rated as important by 44 per cent of those polled.
Most managers also believed the introduction of flexible working to allow workers time off for dealing with personal issues, rather than calling in sick, would help reduce sickness absence rates.

 

 

computer weekly.com

The need to focus on stress was underlined by Dudley Lusted, a director of private health company PPP healthcare, which sponsored the survey. "It is time to get a better grip on longer-term absence and stress-related problems," he says. "Tackling their underlying causes and supporting people with early access to medical and psychological care are key to achieving the 5.3 days' absence levels attained by the best-performing companies." In IT, fitting people in the right jobs is also important, says John Eary, skills services manager at the National Computing Centre. "Some programmers are only at their best when faced with the challenge and focus of tight project deadlines, and will work round the clock, because they see it as a creative process," he says. "But others can't handle that and prefer to be maintenance programmers with regular hours. "Support can be stressful too. People can be overwhelmed with user demand, suffer abuse and see themselves as having low standing in the IT department,"adds Eary. "There's a diversity of jobs in IT and it's important to make sure you get the one that suits you." Eary backs the implication of the CBI survey that people might be getting more stressed but taking fewer days off because of fears about getting behind in their work. The CBI conclusions are also confirmed by a separate study by the Institute of Personnel and Development, which shows that stress is now the biggest reason for sick days among white-collar staff, after minor complaints such as colds. "Changes in morale or workload or both are cited as the main reasons for absence," says the institute's employer relations adviser, Diane Sinclair. More than a third of employers now offer stress counselling, the survey shows. Sinclair says companies should also look at "more flexible family-friendly policies". The need here is also highlighted by a third study by Aon Consulting, which shows that 61% of staff believe their employers do not recognise a need to balance work and home life. This survey also puts stress at the top of the list of issues, and calls for flexible working policies based on people's private lives. "Organisations that demonstrate commitment to employees will win the battle to attract and retain skilled and committed staff," says Aon managing director Patrick Carter. Studies by the Health and Safety Executive, which show that stress is a serious problem leading to physical and mental illness and dependence on alcohol, have led the organisation to prepare action. Options being considered range from an employer's guide to a code of practice and even legislation.