Occupational hazards, injuries and diseases are a major concern among police officers, including in Sub-Saharan Africa. However, there is limited locally relevant literature for guiding policy for the South African Police Service (SAPS). The purpose of this review was to describe the occupational hazards, injuries and diseases affecting police officers worldwide, in order to benchmark policy implications for the SAPS. We conducted a systematic review of studies using Google Scholar, PubMed and Scopus. A total of 36 studies were included in this review. Six revealed that police officers’ exposure to accident hazards may lead to acute or chronic injuries such as sprains, fractures or even fatalities. These hazards may occur during driving, patrol or riot control. There were two studies, which confirmed physical hazards such as noise induced hearing loss (NIHL), due to exposure to high levels of noise. Three studies on chemical hazards revealed that exposure to high concentrations of carbon dioxide and general air pollution was associated with cancer, while physical exposure to other chemical substances was linked to dermatitis. Four studies on biological hazards demonstrated potential exposure to blood borne diseases from needle stick injuries (NSIs) or cuts from contaminated objects. One study on ergonomic hazards showed that musculoskeletal disorders can result from driving long distances and lifting heavy objects. There were 15 studies that indicated psychological hazards such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as well as stress. Moreover, four studies were conducted on organizational hazards including burnout, negative workplace exposure and other factors. This review outlined the global impact of occupational hazards, injuries and diseases in the police force. It served as a benchmark for understanding the policy implications for South Africa, where there is paucity of studies on occupational health and safety.

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A systematic review on occupational hazards, injuries and diseases among police officers worldwide: Policy implications for the South African Police Service

Leadership support has been identified as an essential component of successful workplace health promotion (WHP) programs. However, there is little research in this area and even less theoretical conceptualization on ways in which leadership support for WHP is related to improved employee wellbeing. In this paper, we developed and tested a model of leadership support for WHP and employee wellbeing outcomes using employer and employee data gathered from 71 South African organizations. A theoretical model based on social exchange theory was developed. It was hypothesized that perceptions of company commitment to health promotion mediates the relationship between leadership support, the provision of WHP facilities and employee wellbeing. A hierarchical structural equation modeling technique was used to test the model. We determined that leaders' support for WHP was important insofar as they also provided health promotion facilities to their employees. No direct relationship was found between leadership support alone and employee wellbeing.

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The relationship between leadership support, workplace health promotion and employee wellbeing in South Africa.

Objective: To describe a 2010 initiative to encourage companies in South Africa to adopt workplace health promotion programs.

Methods: Data documenting organizational efforts to improve workers’ health were collected from 71 participating employers and 11,472 workers completing health assessments. Organizational and employee health were scored on the basis of responses to the surveys that asked about facilities and programs offered, leadership support for health promotion, and employees’ health status.

Results: In its first year, the initiative recruited 101 organizations and 71 qualified for the award. Results aggregated across these companies focus on elements constituting organizational and individual health, with specific measures that companies can review to determine whether they and their employees are 'healthy'.
 Conclusions: The Healthiest Company Index provided useful baseline data to support employers’ efforts to develop and implement effective and impactful health promotion programs.

The Healthiest Company Index: a campaign to promote worksite wellness in South Africa.

Well on the way: An exploratory study on occupational health in hospitality

s on organisational psychology consistently revolved around organisational development, organisational culture, leadership, leadership development and teams. Teams and diversity management were frequently covered throughout the twelve year period. Abstracts on job attitudes namely job satisfaction and organisational commitment were common across the entire twelve year period. However, there was a marked increase in abstracts discussing job attitudes within the 2008-2011 time period owing to the emergence of research on other job attitudes namely employee engagement, employee withdrawal and workplace deviance. Over the years, the most frequently appearing themes in psychological assessment were personality assessment; test/construct development, measurement and validation; fairness, bias and best practices in psychological assessment; emotional intelligence and cognitive ability testing; cross-cultural validation of tests and constructs; assessment centres; and statistical techniques and research methods. Out of the 864 abstracts that were analysed, 101 abstracts (12%) were on validation studies that examined one type of validity or another. The types of validity examined by the validation studies included face, content, convergent, divergent, discriminant, predictive, incremental, criterion, construct and cross-cultural validity.

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Industrial and Organisational Psychology in South Africa: Research and Practice.

Orientation: This article focuses on how South African organisations manage their employees’ wellness through their Employee Wellness Programmes (EWPs). Research purpose: The objective of this research is to describe employee wellness in South Africa by investigating the types, foci and perceived success of EWPs. Motivation for the study: Despite the growing awareness of the importance of EWPs in South Africa, the nature, content, context, participants, role-players and anticipated benefits as well as the possible drawbacks of these programmes in the South African context are unclear. Research design, approach and method: The researchers used a cross-sectional design. The first author developed the Employee Wellness Survey, consisting of quantitative and qualitative questions, to collect data from 16 organisations, four service providers and seven labour unions in South Africa. Main findings: The results showed that organisations, service providers and labour unions define employee wellness differently and that these role players give different reasons for introducing EWPs. Almost half of the participating organisations have no baseline measurement with which to compare the effectiveness of their EWPs. Generally, all the organisations present the results of their programmes reasonably. However, the programmes involve little overall expenditure to the organisations. Practical/managerial implications: Organisations should monitor the state of their employees’ wellness in order to manage it effectively. This will only become possible when information about employee wellness improves. Contribution/value-add: This study provides new information about the nature, content, context, participants, role-players, anticipated benefits and possible drawbacks of EWPs in the South-African context.

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Charlotte Sieberhagen

Papers

Management of employee wellness in South Africa: employer, service provider and union perspectives