Socialized occupational medicine in Israel: past, present, and future

Abstract

Occupational health in Israel is unique as it was originally established as a socialized service which anchored in extensive legislation and is accessible to all employees and employers without copayment. We review historical processes and legal basis that led to current structure of public occupational medicine services in Israel. Some of these go back a century and others extend way back to biblical times. Representative case studies from the field are used to illustrate its scope of practice. Legislative changes that exempted the employers from participation in financing occupational health have led to severe budget cuts, jeopardizing the future provision and key principles of occupational healthcare. We discuss future aspects of recommended development vectors for policy making that will preserve the structure of occupational health services and benefits it offers to all workers in Israel.

Keywords:

• Case Studies
• Fitness for Duty
• History
• Israel
• Occupational Health
• Occupational Medicine Residency
• Return to Work
• Socialized Medicine
• Work Capacity
• Worker’s Health Legislation
• Workers with Disability

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Institution and ethical approval and informed consent

We describe historical and legislative perspectives of our filed in Israel, as well as typical medical activities that do not correspond to the definition of “research,” and do not include a systematic investigation; therefore, the approval of the IRB Committee was not required.