Office employees who mostly spend more than four hours a day in front of a computer (and who currently also work from home) account for a large portion of the current labour market. Office work involves stress and many hours spent in a sitting position. Additionally, people who spend many hours in air-conditioned rooms are more exposed to respiratory infections and problems involving eyesight and skin, such as dry skin and dry eye syndrome.
According to Medicover Polska’s data, the average length of office employees’ sick leaves is 12.6 days per year, which means costs both on the part of the employees and the employer.
The specific nature of office work varies from industry to industry and on different positions. However, some of the health problems are common and equally affect people working in consulting companies, translation agencies, accounting offices and other places.
EXCESSIVE BMI AND OBESITY
According to the Well.Hr – Na Zdrowie study, about 50% of office employees have excessive BMI, while 20% – high cholesterol levels. Long hours in a sitting position and meals eaten in a hurry at a desk do not help maintain the right body mass. Webinars on healthy diet and online consultations with a dietician will help them understand the rules of healthy eating and integrate them into their everyday life.
Physical activity is complementary to a healthy diet. When applied in right doses, it helps maintain good health and reduce the risk of developing lifestyle and neoplastic diseases. Providing employees with a state-of-the-art platform that guarantees access to many types of online sports training, advice and trivia on healthy lifestyle positively affects their body mass and helps reduce their stress.
Working at a computer may cause back pain, stiffness, neck tingling, hand pain and even chronic conditions, such as carpal tunnel or frozen shoulder. In order to verify the correct organisation of workstations, consider carrying out an ergonomic audit. Even an audit completed on a remote basis ensures healthy and ergonomic working conditions, despite the fact that most companies work in the home office mode. But the remote audit also has other advantages: it reduces workplace disruption, and may include even large groups of employees.
By persuading employees to take active breaks, even while working from home, you will reduce the risk of developing various conditions resulting from a forced body posture.
COLD, VIRAL INFECTIONS AND FLU
As compared with other occupational groups, office employees are more likely to work despite being ill and feeling unwell. Prevention is important during the infection season: webinars on infection prevention and control will help employees avoid the disease or recover from it more quickly.
Stress is present many occupational groups. However, office employees are particularly prone to stress, running various projects, taking care of external customers and working under time pressure in a changing environment.
When work from home intensifies, technological stress becomes a serious concern because of the need to quickly adapt to sudden changes in working conditions. Consultations with a psychologist, and webinars on how to deal with stress, how to find a healthy work-life balance and how to deal with work during the epidemic will help employees manage their private and professional life.
In addition to psychological support in the context of dealing with stress, it is important to ensure entertainment. In order to make the choice easier for employees and enable them to spend time with their family, it is worth considering a benefit platform, offering hundreds of suggestions on how they can spend their free time.
