Sandy,
In relation to pre employment assessment and the human rights
legislation one useful document would be the Council of Europe's
recent publication:
Medical examinations preceding employment and/or private
insurance: A proposal for European Guidelines.
ISBN 92-871-4252-1 (April 2000)
This will not give you a definitive answer as to what you should do
in the NHS, but it will highlight the issues of concern in relation to
human rights that have been discussed in Europe.
If the pre employment assessment is used to help control health
and safety risks (to the individual or others) then there can be a
good argument for access to private medical information, which
relates to the job. However, if the aim of pre employment
assessment (as some have argued) includes trying to identify an
increased risk of sickness absence, or to prevent people like
Beverley Allitt from being employed, then I think that the process
will not meet these expectations and that we will run into further
difficulties with human rights legislation.
One of the main problems is in defining managers (and OH
professionals) expectations of the pre employment assessment
and then in seeing if the process is at all likely to meet these
expectations - I suspect not
Best wishes
Stuart
Dr. S.C. Whitaker
Senior Research Fellow
Head of Health Services Research Unit
Institute of Occupational Health
University of Birmingham
Birmingham B15 2TT
Tel (44) 0121 414 6010
Fax (44) 0121 414 6217
e-mail [log in to unmask]
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