FEBRUARY 2014
Employers must monitor risk
Continued from page 9
launching a lunch and learn or health
fair — there's a lot more involved, employees have to take an hour off work
so there's a productivity issue — but the
returns are well worth the investment of
time," said McCaig.
"It should not be seen as (an) expense
because every one of your wellness initiatives will stem from that aggregate report afterwards."
Most people don't know their cholesterol numbers so it's about having that
information, having that conversation,
so they can set goals around them, said
Chidester.
"We really encourage people to be
involved in their health, so we do think
that risk assessments are very valuable
for people to participate in," she said,
adding her organization's 700 employees are encouraged to take the Heart and
Stroke Foundation's online risk assessment.
"Up to 80 per cent of premature heart
disease and stroke is preventable… but
we do have to have an understanding of
what our risk factors are, and because
our risk factors are connected with our
lifestyles, the more information we have,
the better," said Chidester.
A risk assessment can bring any concerns to the forefront, said Cindy Hitsman, senior director of business develop-
ment at VON (Victorian Order of Nurses)
Canada in Ottawa.
"It does help people to recognize that
these are some factors."
Full picture needed
But one test may not provide a full picture, so it's about what people do with
the information, she said.
"If you're just going to take your
blood sugar one day or your blood pressure, any one given day, it could be
anything, so there really does need to
be a baseline and followup thereafter...
so getting that information and sharing
it with your health practitioner is pretty
important. And making sure you're following through."
And while many diseases can take
years to take effect, that doesn't mean
employers should ignore the risks, said
Hitsman.
"It instills the fact that the employer
actually cares about the employee and,
in that sense, it does increase people's
productivity and their likelihood they're
going to continue working in that workforce," she said.
"So there are cost implications — a
healthy employee is a productive employee, an active employee is a productive employee — so by employers showing employees that they care enough
and really want their employees to be
healthy, it helps their bottom line."
Changes are a warning: Expert
Continued from page 10
cant new fees and paperwork requirements make the TFWP more difficult to
access for small businesses and do less
to protect temporary foreign workers
than regulations requiring a safe workplace and allowing for timely responses
to abuse, Kelly said.
Amendments to the TFWP were first
announced in Canada's Economic Action Plan 2013. Regulatory and administrative changes were introduced that
will give the government authority to
conduct inspections to make sure employers are meeting the conditions of the
12
program, strengthen criteria for assessing labour market opinion applications
and give the government authority to revoke or refuse to process work permits
when necessary.
The changes, including the most recent
amendments, came into effect on Dec. 31.
Moving forward, MacEwen hopes
the amended regulations will serve as
a warning to employers that the abuse
of temporary foreign workers will not be
accepted.
Without the proper enforcement, it
will be "completely superfluous; it just
looks nice, it doesn't actually do anything," she said.
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