The screening of life
A pioneering Irish health organisation is providing construction workers with free on-site health screening during working hours.
The screenings, offered by the Construction Workers Health Trust (CWHT), invite workers to book a 30 minute dedicated screening session with a CWHT nurse.
During a screening, the nurse takes a brief history of your medical and family history as well as your current lifestyle, which can help capture any areas of potential concern. Then you will have your blood pressure, BMI, and lung function checked. Cholesterol and blood sugars are also checked using a simple finger prick test, which means there’s no fasting required, and no big needles used. Results are immediate and discussed with the worker and personalised lifestyle advice given.
CWHT provides for access to the Cushla Health personal electronic health record app and, through it, workers receive a weekly health information article. These articles provide relevant health details from a trusted source helping workers become more engaged with their health.
According to CWHT, one of the best ways of looking after your health is to have regular preventative health screenings to measure your blood pressure, body mass index, cholesterol, and glucose levels.
These simple screening tests can check how your body is working and may help find any issues when they are easier to treat or even prevent. Often when issues are identified early, making simple lifestyle changes can stop any issues in their tracks and improve your health in the short, medium, and long term, say CWHT experts.
One example of this is high blood pressure (hypertension) which can damage heart and blood vessels over time. High blood pressure can often have no symptoms until it's very serious.
Another example is high cholesterol which can build up in the arteries, blocking blood flow. You won’t feel it happening, but it raises your risk of heart attack or stroke.
Established by the construction group of trade unions, the Construction Workers Health Trust (CWHT) is an organisation with charitable status funded from voluntary contributions from construction companies and workers who are members of the Construction Workers Pension Scheme. CWHT provides construction workers with free, on-site screening during working hours. Screenings are arranged through the site Health and Safety Officers and workers are invited to book a 30 minute dedicated screening session with the CWHT nurse.
For further information, see cwht.ie. To book health screening for your site, contact CWHT operations manager, Lesliann, at lesliann.flynn@cwht.ie, or call 01 7093070.