Primary secondary and tertiary prevention

What can be done?

Optimal results are more likely to be achieved if workplace interventions are not narrowly focused on preventing individual psychological injuries, but more broadly focused on managing the interrelationship between individual and organisational health.

Intervention strategies may be classified by focus of prevention efforts. There are three levels of prevention:

• Primary prevention - seeks to alter the source of stress and to buffer employees against the impact of operational stressors. May focus on the worker (eg stress management training), the workplace (eg job redesign) or the interface between the worker and the workplace (eg selection processes, training for managers, supportive leadership and team climate)

• Secondary prevention - aims to reduce the severity of the consequences of stress before they become more serious. Tends to focus mainly on the individual (eg employee assistance programs, medical treatment, counselling), and

• Tertiary prevention - involves treatment of the identified condition and amelioration or restoration to a full state of health and functioning (eg return to work through case management).

Research indicates that priority should be given to primary prevention intervention, followed by secondary and tertiary intervention.

The impact of intervention is maximised however when the three complement each other and are linked through feedback and monitoring systems

An approach that incorporates organisationally-focussed primary, secondary and tertiary interventions is likely to have more success in reducing the incidence and severity of psychological injury.