OH Systems in Public Healthcare Facilities 1 VOL. 48 NO. 3 2014 ACTA MEDICA PHILIPPINA _______________ Corresponding author: Paul Michael R. Hernandez, MD, MOH Department of Environmental and Occupational Health College of Public Health University of the Philippines Manila 625 Pedro Gil Street, Ermita, Manila 1000 Philippines Telephone: +632 5247102 Email: prhernandez@up.edu.ph Occupational Health Systems across Selected Public Healthcare Facilities in the Philippines Paul Michael R. Hernandez, Romeo R. Quizon, Guillano C. Lacsamana and Joanna I. Remaneses Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, College of Public Health, University of the Philippines Manila Introduction According to the World Health Organization (WHO), a health system is composed of all organizations, people and actions whose primary intent is to promote, restore or maintain health. To achieve its goals, a health system needs to carry out some basic functions; these were identified and grouped by the WHO into a set of six essential building blocks, all of which are needed to improve health outcomes. Based on WHO’s health system framework, these are: (1) good health services which could be delivered in the most efficient way possible, (2) a health workforce which must be in an optimum balance of sufficiency and competency in order to deliver quality services, (3) a health information system which could serve as a database for the different health determinants, (4) cost-effective medical products and technologies which are easily accessible to healthcare workers, (5) a health financing system which ensures that the budget for health is adequate to cater to the needs of the people accessing healthcare services, and (6) good leadership and governance, responsible for developing different policies and strategic frameworks to be able to suit the health system to the public’s needs. 1 Table 1 discusses occupational health systems based on these six components in the local and global context. Furthermore, Table 2 shows what should be expected of an occupational health system in Philippine healthcare facilities based on the existing rules and regulations (The Philippine Occupational Safety and Health Standards and DOH Administrative Order 2012- 0020). Good leadership and governance in the context of OHS is the key to good workplace health promotion and protection policies. OHS committees are responsible in carrying out this task in their respective work areas. St. Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney, Australia has an OHS policy which advocates best practices in health and safety through the incorporation of its workforce in the formulation of OHS programs in their hospital. 2,3 Public hospitals in Victoria, Australia also adhere to this policy through its blueprint in the formation of their OHS committees. 4 Other countries such as Ireland and the USA include the same OHS policies, with additional provisions such as: (1) the follow-up of staff who have been involved in violent incidents at work, (2) the administration of pre-employment medical examinations, (3) the maintenance of employee medical records, and (4) the administration of special medical examinations, such as ORIGINAL ARTICLE