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Many health and social care professionals tell us that they're not having the depth of conversation with patients about work issues that they'd like, for fear of not knowing how to handle the issues they may identify.
Macmillan is developing a range of learning tools and resources to support health and social care professionals in talking about employment issues with people affected by cancer. The following current and upcoming resources are intended to give you the knowledge, skills and confidence you need to talk to your patients about work issues as well as empower patients to seek work support when needed.
In March and April 2011, Macmillan commissioned research with health and social care professionals. Focus groups looked at what conversations professionals currently have with patients about work and cancer. It also identified professionals’ learning and development needs and preferences, and some cultural barriers that can stand in the way of behaviour change. The Can we talk about work? [PDF, 1.13Mb]| report summarises the research findings and will inform Macmillan’s future efforts to develop new work and cancer learning and development resources.
We have developed a new educational resource for Occupational Health Practitioners (OHPs), to help raise OHP awareness of the work-limiting effects of the most common cancers. The course has been endorsed and accredited by the Faculty of Occupational Medicine (FOM) for two continuing professional development (CPD) points and is available on Learn Zone| now. After you’ve registered for Learn Zone, which is free, please go to the Health and Social Care Professionals section. Choose E-learning and videos and after that the Working with Cancer course will be the third item.
Macmillan is currently developing an online learning module for health and social care professionals about work and cancer. The purpose of the online module will be to improve professionals’ understanding of work and cancer issues and increase their confidence in discussing work issues with their cancer patients. We plan to launch this new tool early in 2012. It will be available free to use on Learn Zone|.
Macmillan is also producing a new screening/triage tool to help health professionals identify employment and financial needs and signpost more effectively. The tool consists of flow diagrams to follow, and helps health professionals signpost people affected by cancer to services and advice on returning to or staying in work.
We organised a small reference group in December 2010 that gave its feedback on the triage tool. Taking into account the suggestions made by the group, the tool will be redesigned by the Macmillan team and will be available for testing later in 2011.
It can be hard for patients to know what questions to ask and who to talk to when it comes to work issues. So we've created The essential questions to ask about work tool [PDF, 221kb]| featuring a range of questions for every stage of the cancer journey, with details of who to ask - for example, a GP or line manager. Please signpost patients to this tool and empower them to ask he right questions at the right time.
Visit our main Work & cancer section| for more in-depth information about work and employment related issues, for both employees and employers.
Go to the Work and cancer section|