Mapping out the territory

This commentary is a response to the paper "Healthy Workplaces for Health Workers in Canada: Knowledge Transfer and Uptake in Policy and Practice," in which Shamian and El-Jardali describe completed research and policy directions to improve work-life practices and create healthy workplaces in the environments where health workers are employed. Two issues that are raised in the discussion are focused on, the first one being health of the workforce and the second concerning workload measurement and work overload. Evidence from two recently completed studies is provided to demonstrate the importance of monitoring the health of caregivers and the need for development of new workload measurement systems. Such progress requires large-scale studies to help us understand the correlates of staff satisfaction, staffing outcomes and workplace demands. Most importantly, evaluation of policy intervention in Canada has been limited; therefore, once fiscal and human resources are directed to policy initiatives, these actions need to be formally evaluated.