A report from the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) and the Faculty of Occupational Medicine has revealed that only 15% of NHS Trusts have a policy or plan to help combat staff obesity.
The findings come from the first national audit within the NHS of National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) public health guidance for the workplace. Implementation of the NICE guidance was recommended by the Boorman Review, which found clear associations between better staff health and wellbeing and reduced MRSA rates, lower standardised mortality rates and increased patient satisfaction. The audit report also found that Trusts were failing to follow NICE guidance on physical activity, with only 32% of the participant organisations having a plan or policy to encourage and support staff to be more physically active. Other key findings include the fact that less than one in three of the participating trusts offered evidence based weight management programmes for their staff. Only 31% of Trusts promoted healthy options for staff in their shops, and out of the 42 Trusts that did have a plan or policy for tackling staff obesity, only 13 measured uptake of any programmes by different staff groups such as by grade, gender or ethnicity.
