07th August 2009 Unlucky break

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The first thing to do is to assess the situation, and Day 1 absence management is key to this. The minimum that anyone with a fracture is going to be off work is a day or two, largely for hospital appointments and assessment and treatment of the damage done. Depending on the fracture, your employee may be incapacitated to a minor or serious degree. Ironically, breaking a finger could affect their ability to work more than breaking a leg, depending on their role. You and they will also have to consider their reliance on public transport, and crucially, how successfully they will negotiate your premises while healing.

Can you relocate their desk to the ground floor for a few weeks? Or can they work effectively from home, more or less as normally, communicating with colleagues by skype, accessing IT systems remotely with colleagues, sending vital documents by post and video conferencing client meetings? Can essential team meetings be held close to their home? With the immediacy by the normal routine.

If you need the employee to be in the office, and their doctor feels that he or she is well enough to return despite the mobility impairment, under Health & Safety legislation, you will probably need to carry out a personal risk assessment. You must ensure that they can carry out their job in safety without putting themself or their colleagues at any increased risk – particularly if they are now less mobile and potentially more vulnerable.

Your assessment should take into account aspects such as fire evacuation arrangements for the building and access to facilities such as toilets, as well as the nature of their work itself.

You may wish to consider:

  • occupational health assessment
  • return-to-work plan
  • help with transport
  • adapting working hours to allow employee to miss rush hour travelling
  • lighter duties for the short term
  • time off for physiotherapy or other treatment
  • ‘buddy’ allocation for general help and fire evacuation purposes
  • temporarily increasing, relocating or adapting the workspace
  • providing additional equipment to improve safety and speed recovery
  • whether facilitating working from home would be a better option

For further advice, visithttp://www.hse.gov.uk/sicknessabsence/reasonableadjustments.htm