It is a World Mental Health Day
today, 10th Oct 2017 and this year theme is Mental Health at Workplace. By definition,
mental health means “one self who are conscious about his/her potential, can
cope with stress in life, who can work productively and be able to contribute
good things to the community”. This has been further explain by the WHO that an
individual who are mentally healthy should be able to maintain a harmonize
relationship with others and taking active parts in societal activities;
including at a workplace.
One health statistic shows that
30% of the Malaysian population at the age of 17 to 40 yrs old are having
mental health problems. In fact almost 5 million of the total population are having
mental health issues. Among the common illness are depression, anxiety
disorder, stress, panic, sleep disorder, anger and such. For the organization,
this will be closely tight up with the safety and health aspect at the
workplace, and should not be left behind. Both the employer and employees
should understand what are the risks and hazards identified at our work area,
which in general it has been classified to 6 categories – physical, electrical,
biological, chemical, ergonomic and psycho social. The question now, have we
identified each and every mentioned hazards?
It is our obligation to raise the
awareness on the psychosocial risks at workplace such as work pressure,
fatigue, ergonomic, double standard, bully, disobey instruction, discrimination
and such. Feel free to meet your counselor (yes I am a registered counselor) to discuss about any psychosocial
problems that you might have. You may also take the stress test and the
personality test to identify your strengths and weaknesses. In providing more
dynamic services, I am now in the midst of drafting a policy and procedure on
Psychological Risk Management at workplace. I foresee this as a proactive
measure in providing awareness and as part of my Employee Assistance Program to all.
References:
1. Institute
of Islamic Understanding Malaysia
2. Ministry of Health
3. NIOSH
4. WHO
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