Three-quarters (75%) of occupational health practitioners say they have experienced abuse, bullying or harassment at work, and 40% report discrimination, according to what researchers believe is the first study of its kind into mistreatment of the OH workforce.

The findings, published in the Society of Occupational Medicine's journal Occupational Medicine, carry direct implications for HR teams that commission and manage occupational health services. Nearly half of reported incidents (47%) came from the employers practitioners serve — including managers and HR — rather than from the workers they assess. For people-operations leaders, the data raises questions about how internal clients treat a function that sits at the intersection of employee wellbeing, absence management and fitness-for-work decisions.

Researchers led by Professor Drushca Lalloo, honorary professor in occupational medicine at the University of Glasgow, surveyed 367 OH practitioners — physicians, nurses, advisors and allied health professionals — in collaboration with the Society of Occupational Medicine (SOM) and the Faculty of Occupational Medicine (FOM).

The sources of mistreatment are spread across the practitioners' whole working ecosystem. Workers being assessed in clinic accounted for the largest share of bullying, harassment or abuse (59%). Employers the practitioners provide services to followed at 47%. Discrimination showed a different pattern: employers (20%) and colleagues (20%) were the most frequent instigators, with clinic attendees close behind at 19%.

The scale exceeds even NHS benchmarks. SOM pointed out that the rates of bullying, harassment and abuse among OH practitioners are significantly higher than those in annual NHS staff surveys, where one in four staff (25%) report such treatment from patients, service users, relatives or the public.

What the researchers recommend

The authors urge OH providers to act on several fronts: clear policies, confidential reporting channels, better training and education, fair and prompt investigations, and a much more proactive leadership culture.

One recommendation touches HR processes directly. "When employees attend occupational health, the invitation to attend the clinic should be accompanied by a standardised statement of the responsibilities of the occupational health clinicians to both the employer and employee, so as to reduce the likelihood of any misunderstanding of the purpose and role of the occupational health professional," the researchers wrote.

That proposal addresses a structural tension in how OH services operate. Practitioners owe duties to both the commissioning employer and the employee being assessed, and the study suggests that ambiguity over that dual role feeds conflict — from employees suspicious of the process and from employer clients pushing for particular outcomes.

SOM president Professor Neil Greenberg described the levels of abuse as "totally unacceptable". He added: "While abuse and bullying from patients and workers is bad enough, the extent to which practitioners are also suffering at the hands of co-workers and even the very employers they are contracted to work for is appalling."

Questions for HR and OH buyers

For employers that contract OH providers, the findings raise concrete due-diligence questions. Does the provider have confidential reporting channels for its practitioners? How are referrals framed to employees before they attend a clinic? What happens when a manager or HR contact pressures an OH professional over a fitness-for-work report?

The 47% figure on employer-sourced mistreatment also suggests a governance gap. Organisations with anti-bullying policies for their own workforce may have no equivalent framework governing how staff treat external clinicians working on their behalf.

The study's publication in a peer-reviewed journal, with a sample of 367 practitioners across the main OH professional groups, gives HR leaders a baseline against which to review both their internal OH functions and their external provider relationships. As awareness of the findings spreads, OH providers and their employer clients are likely to face sharper scrutiny of the safeguards — or the absence of them — protecting the practitioners who deliver those services.