Exploring Occupational Health Professionals Understanding and Needs in Regard to Total Worker Health (TWH)

Occupational health professionals (OHPs) are in a unique position to impact the health and well-being of employees at work and outside of work. One way of achieving this holistic health goal is to integrate the concept of Total Worker Health® (TWH) into the organization's culture. It is critical for OHPs to develop the ability to incorporate TWH into their practices, yet there are gaps in our understanding of OHP's attitudes toward change and toward TWH, their level of TWH knowledge, and the number of OHPs who have adopted TWH.

An electronic survey was administered to a national sample of 4,777. This cross-sectional study used Qualtrics to record survey responses measuring knowledge of TWH, attitude toward change, resistance to change, transformational leadership ability, perception of organizational readiness, and leadership commitment.

The total sample size was 253 (5.3%). Most respondents were bachelors prepared nurses (75.1%) with greater than 10 years' experience (71.5%) and employed in manufacturing (42.6%). Approximately 74% (n = 125) of respondents knew about TWH, but did not have a program in place or were unsure of the existence of one. A high percentage (74.0%) were open to implementing TWH, had favorable attitudes toward change (M = 3.9 on a 5-point Likert-type scale), but needed education on how to move forward (56.0%).

Findings suggest that most OHPs know about TWH, but generally have not adopted the TWH concept at their worksites. However, they are open to implementing TWH programs and have favorable attitudes toward change.