Pre-placement Testing

Musculoskeletal injuries can cost companies millions of dollars every year in reduced productivity, replacement wages, medical costs, lump sum payments and performance based workers compensation premiums. Employers have a responsibility to ensure, as far as is practicable, that each employee whilst at work is safe from injury and risks to their health. Traditionally, the focus has been on designing and altering the demands of the job to suit the capabilities of the employee. An alternative to this approach would be to consider matching the workers to the job demands on the basis of their physical abilities.

High quality Pre-placement Screening can assist employers to make informed decisions when called to select, match and accommodate a potential candidate's capabilities to perform the identified physical demands of work. If possible, a Pre-placement Screening should be a valid indicator of whether an injury would occur, if a particular individual were to carry out the identified job demands over time, thus allowing prevention strategies to be better focused by the employer.

After a health screening has been performed to determine the person's fitness to complete the assessment, the pre-placement assessment of the person's fitness to perform the potential job follows with specific tests tailored by high risk requirements identified in job analysis.

LHS would produce a Pre-Placement Screening certificate stating whether the person was either:

1.	Able to meet all key physical requirements.
2.	Able to meet most of the key physical requirements with these restrictions (listed).
3.	Not able to meet the key physical requirements-referred for medical opinion.

DID YOU KNOW?

1.	Under the OH&S Act 2000, employers must ensure that they provide a safe work environment for their employees.

Why choose a Pre-placement assessment at LHS over a Pre-placement medical?

2.	Medical Assessments look at generic health issues such as blood pressure and weight which may not give an accurate indication of a worker's capacity to perform a task.
3.	Pre-placement assessment (not a medical) results indicate that there is a high level of cost effectiveness with significant reduction in the number of injuries and incidents for new employees in the first 12 months of employment. (Moving in on Occupational Health-Worth 2000)