Getting to Know You: Occupational Health Researchers Investigate Employee Assistance Professionals' Approaches to Workplace Stress

Abstract

Workplace stress is strongly associated with health problems, including cardiovascular disease. The occupational health field is developing partnerships with a variety of health professions to prevent and address job stress at the organizational level. A review of literature for and about employee assistance professionals was conducted to explore their perspectives on these issues. Results show high awareness regarding the health effects of job stress and a wide range of approaches to address this problem. EAPs appear to be a potential strong partner in efforts to prevent workplace stress, but face obstacles to intervening at the level of the work environment.

KEYWORDS:

• cardiovascular disease
• dual client relationship
• occupational health
• organizational intervention
• stress
• work environment

The Center for the Promotion of Health in the New England Workplace is supported by Grant Number 1 U19 OH008857 from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) (CDC). This work is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of NIOSH. The authors are grateful for the assistance of Peter Sullivan, CEAP, and David Worster, CEAP, for their review and input on this article. We are also grateful to the Massachusetts–Rhode Island Chapter of Employee Assistance Professionals Association for their ongoing support and discourse on the topic of workplace stress. Finally, we thank Julie Brodie, MA, for her capable assistance with references.