[CATHYW]

Welcome, Chris. I am the only nurse here at an aluminum extrusion company. Do you do Wellness, in addition to Occ Med? Do you have an onsite Doc, or telephone consult with one? Do you have Health Fairs, and if you do, how in the world do you interest your shipbuilders to participate?
I only have a few hundred questions! LOL! It is just that I rarely get to talk with Occ Med Nurses who practice alone.

[chrisrob]

cathy,
sorry i took so long to reply, onsite doctor one morning per week yes i do wellness, West of Scotland has a long history of CHD CVA etc so the guys are really interested if I put on any health promotion they are taking an interest in their health. this month is testicular cancer awareness month but I'm not going there I couldn't cope with their comments!!I can phone the Doc if I have problems. talk again soon

[CATHYW]

Thanks for the information, Chris. I hope that your wellness screening goes well. Our situations seem somewhat similar. However, while the Occ Med MD is just a phone call or e-mail away, we don't ever have one on-site.
I'm sure you must be busy, but stay in touch. It is good to hear from one who walks in similar shoes!

[angieh]

hello all occ health nurses I am an occupational health nurse in the Uk. I t's great to read all your messages, different queries and the replies you recieve and compare them to our standards and legislation. If I can be of any help just leave a message
Angieh, RN

[chrisrob]

hi
can anyone help me does anyone work in heavy industry and do testing for VWF if you do what sort of testing do you do the testing we do is mainly subjective and going on symptoms the guys in the shipyard describe they are nearly all stage three to move them all of vibration tools would shut the yard I know that I'm being conned because most of them have put in claims and won varaible amounts of money anyone help with diggerent testing thanks ps they also run their hands in freezing water for 15 mins before testing or use a vibration tool for at least an hour beofre their survellance how can i get round this thinkng that they can con me? help!!!!

[susanrn]

Is there any chance of scheduling the tests before they begin work? I am not sure of the policies in Scotland. I have had some issues here in regards to people not wanting to wear a respirator to work either in confined spaces or working with chemicals(they didn't want to work with the chemicals at all-even with a respirator). They would answer yes to questions which would disqualify them from being able to use a respirator, therefore, not have to do that job duty. I would then inform them if they could not do all the aspects of the job, they may therefore, not be able to remain employed in that status. Some departments are not able to accomodate a restriction such as not being able to use a respirator. If there was a possibility of using the situation that they may no longer be employed, sometimes that works. On the other hand, when you are talking about issues where the problem is that it may be work related, that may be hard. Are there any engineering controls that could be used to decrease the vibration-I'm sure you have already thought of that, just trying to help. If I can think of anything else, I will let you know. Good Luck!

[ERNurse752]

I just went to Occ Health part time, from being in the ER full-time...so now I do both.
I'm the After Hours Occ Health nurse, and I'm based in the same ER I work as a regular staff nurse in.
We have contracts with 8,000 companies, as well as our own hospital network.
So far I don't really like it...the paperwork is driving me up the wall. All the companies want things a different way, and with 8,000 of them...I think I may go insane.
Did anyone else go through that at first?

[susanrn]

You are in a much different position than I am since I work for one company, but I know what you mean. Occ health is a very diffferent type of "nursing", it took me awhile to get used to it, but I love it now. It is a lot of paperwork, maybe your facility could look into some type of computer program to help you. Good Luck

[nurseT]

Hi all, I surfed your category out of curiosity. There is an opening for OHN in a large steel company in my area. I,m always looking even though I enjoy my current position. What do OHN's do anyway? Please don't use initials or abreviations, I have no clue. What is the pay, hours, do you have to be on call or work weekends, does it require travel re: business trips. Would I be bite'n off more than I can chew without prior experiance. Add states no experiance necessary.

[wrightgd]

Occ Health Nursing involves so many things... If I tried to describe everything that Occ Health Nurses do, then I would leave something out... The fact is that it's different depending on what setting you work in... Just like the difference between a med-surg floor vs ER vs labor and delivery... They all work as "hospital nurses" but they do drastically different work... You may do safety, wellness programs, ergonomics, some case management...

An OHN may work in one facility, or be responsible for many. I work for one company, but I am responsible for over 1500 employees at 16 different sites, in 7 different states... Yes, I do travel... But, it's not that bad. My job involves alot of time working with local providers who actually do the "nursing work" for our employees... I think my pay is very comparable to hospitals in my home state, but the big benefit is that I don't work weekends or holidays or nights or... I can take a day off without begging...

Check out www.aaohn.com for more details of what OHNursing is about...

Good Luck,
George