Safe Work Australia releases new WHS profile for nursing, care, and support workforce

Safe Work Australia has introduced a new Work Health and Safety profile for the nursing, care, and support workforce, based on the National Dataset for Compensation-based Statistics and ABS Census data.

According to the federal agency, this profile aids in depicting the nature of risks that employees in these industries regularly encounter during the performance of their tasks.

The nursing, care, and support workforce profile indicates that the incidence rate of claims related to 'being assaulted by a person or persons’ is roughly 6.5 times greater than that of all other professions and has risen over the past decade.

Worryingly, there has been a near doubling of mental health claims among these workers over the last decade. The predominant conditions reported are anxiety and stress disorders, reactions to stressors, and post-traumatic stress disorder, which together account for 80% of the claims.

More comprehensive details can be accessed here.