04 December 2009
Bridget Leathley

Sometimes half the risk of being there is getting there. Any work task should, of course, be risk assessed and that includes travelling for work, whether it's a local delivery driver or an international aid worker.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) advice on International Travel and Health for 2009 outlines the key factors which determine risks to travellers. These include mode of transport, destination, accommodation, the individual's underlying health, duration of travel, and food hygiene.

Trains are among the safest form of travel. The Rail Standards and Safety Board annual safety performance report for 2008 showed rail travel is more than 20 times safer than travelling by car.

Perhaps it's a reflection of its relative lack of risk that there is so little advice on train travel safety. There is a small section on how to avoid slips, trips or falls at stations here, and at Safe Travel there is advice on "Train Travel Safely".

Like trains, planes are a much safer way to travel than cars, and there's little you can do to stop the tiny risk of the aircraft your employees travel in crashing. Two health issues feature frequently in advice on flying for business, and these are DVT (deep vein thrombosis) and jet lag.

Advice on the causes of DVT and how to reduce the risk of developing it during a long-haul flight can be found on the NHS Travel health website, the National Health Travel Network (NaTHNaC) site and on the Department of Health (DH) site.

Jet lag is less serious of course, but frustrating if you arrive in a different time zone and need to work straight away. The NHS Travel health website includes "Avoid jet lag". The British Airways "Good sleep guide" outlines how to avoid and deal with jet lag.

Safe Travel has a section on how to avoid and beat jet lag which provides much the same advice, but adds the warning that travellers over the age of 50 are more prone to jet lag.

If you regularly suffer from jet lag, the commercial company stopjetlag.com will provide you with personal recommendations on when to fly. Their service carries a cost, and I have no idea if it works, but there is lots of interesting information on their website that might help you work out optimum flight times.

Behind the wheel

The most dangerous way of travelling for work is driving. Figures quoted on at least a dozen websites suggest that a quarter of all vehicle miles travelled annually in Britain are for work purposes, and that each week around 200 road deaths and serious injuries involve people travelling for work.

In most cases, these figures are quoted without a traceable reference, but the figures outlined at drivingforbetterbusiness.com seem to be the best starting point.

Note that driving in most other countries is even more dangerous - the UK is the fourth safest with 5.34 deaths per 100,000 people. I probably wouldn't let my employees drive in Russia where the road death rate is more than four times higher.

To check the road fatality rate in the country you're thinking of visiting click here.

If you have to drive, the HSE area on work-related road safety makes it clear that employers have a responsibility to take appropriate steps to safeguard the health and safety of their employees and others who may be affected by their activities when they are driving, whether in a company vehicle or in the employee's own vehicle.

The HSE highlights practical considerations such as the fitness of the driver and the vehicle and case studies outline how policies, travel risk assessments and training programmes can help employers manage work-related road travel.

The HSE covers driver recruitment, training and management here  - see in particular "People's safety". The HSE Research Report (RR 018/2002) Management of Work Related Road Safety provides examples of good practice in occupational road safety policies and procedures.

Supported by the Department for Transport, the Driving for Better Business campaign at drivingforbetterbusiness.com provides case studies, as well as a detailed business case showing how managing work-related road travel can save money.

The RoSPA section on Road Safety Resources for Employers includes free downloadable booklets covering driver training, drinking and drugs, mobile phone use and volunteer drivers.

One organisation which has done much to put procedures in place to manage road risks is NERC, the Natural Environment Research Council. Its policy on the Management of Road Risk includes checklists for drivers, along with policies on mobile phone use and the carriage of dangerous goods.

Steady states

NaTHNaC has advice on individual countries; from the homepage select "Country Information" - the blue world map. Advice covers risk assessment, risk management and further resources on hazards such as insect bites and altitude sickness, relevant to each country.

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) website advises on whether a country is safe to visit, areas to avoid, and details on natural disasters, terrorism, crime and politics.

The FCO recommends travellers take the phone number of the consulate in the country they are visiting, and register with the consulate using their LOCATE service. You can register here to register and here are the reasons why you should.

On the Medical Advisory Services for Travellers Abroad (MASTA) website
you can enter dates for a list of places you are visiting and your travel brief will be emailed to you, with details of vaccinations and other health considerations, linking to more detailed factsheets.

The Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (IOSH) has detailed guidance for business travellers under "Safety in the global village: keeping your staff healthy and safe abroad".

This describes the issues an organisation needs to consider when planning foreign business travel, including an international risk assessment, individual risk profiles and crisis management.

An action plan takes you through preparation and post-visit debriefing, while three further checklists cover "Before you go", "Personal health" and "Once you're there".

While much business travel involves airports, hotels and offices, NERC have researchers working in the most hostile environments, on ships and in light aircraft and at extremes of temperature.

Their stated policy is to apply the same standard of care to work abroad as in the UK. Their health and safety procedure number 18 covers health, safety and security when working overseas, while two forms provide a hazard checklist and a managers' checklist for safety when working overseas.

Fit to go

On the MASTA website the "How does your company compare?" survey suggests protecting employee health with a documented process for checking people are fit enough to travel. For example, being pregnant or overweight may make people more prone to DVT.

Extra care in travel plans may be needed at different stages of pregnancy to ensure a pregnancy remains healthy. The NHS Travel health website includes a section on travel during pregnancy which recommends avoiding air travel in the first three months or after 28 weeks.

Foreign travellers may require vaccinations, and organisations shouldn't leave it to individuals to check what they need for a business trip. The WHO 2009 publication "International Travel and Health" recommends that travellers visit a medical adviser to see which vaccinations they need.

Chapter six gives advice on vaccinations against specific illnesses, as well as specific advice for older, pregnant and frequent travellers, or those with pre-existing medical conditions.

Chapter seven lists areas where malaria is a problem, and Annex one advises where yellow fever vaccinations are needed.

At the NHS Scotland site "fitfortravel" you can pick a destination and get a list of required immunisations, as well as advice on malaria precautions and travel health news.

Since H1N1 (swine flu) has spread worldwide, employees are probably at no greater risk of catching it when travelling than at home.

Advice and up-to-date bulletins can be found on the NaTHNaC and WHO websites.

Solo flight

Business travel should often trigger lone working procedures. For example, is there a local contact who would alert the authorities if your employee didn't return to their hotel or show up at a workplace? If not, do you need a "buddy" back in the office to check with the traveller each day?

You can find further advice here. The later part of this article wanders off the topic of safety on to how to blame other people for your mistakes, but the earlier paragraphs provide a useful checklist to prevent problems on a business trip.

If someone is away from home for a long period, or is travelling frequently, you should consider the problems of isolation. Boredom and loneliness can lead to overeating and lack of exercise, or to unsafe sexual encounters or physical attacks.

There is a section for business travellers at Fit for Travel, which includes advice on culture shock, loneliness and unsafe sex. It advises occupational health departments to take account of the effects of separation from home and from the normal workplace.

Being able to contact people at home and back in the office via your mobile phone may help to reduce feelings of isolation. Check first with the network provider that the phone can make and receive calls in the country being visited. You should be able to find the contact details for your provider here.

Government advice on using your mobile phone abroad is available here.

To prepare business travellers for working in a different culture, advice at www.traveletiquette.co.uk may be useful; see the article "Business etiquette when travelling".

NaTHNaC has a "Travel Health Information Sheet" covering the prevention of food and water-borne diseases. This advises travellers to avoid salads, uncooked fruit and vegetables, buffets and shellfish in countries where water-borne and food-borne illnesses are likely to be a problem.

There is a more detailed WHO document on "Preventing Travellers' Diarrhoea: How to Make Drinking Water Safe" which might be useful if business travel takes you away from a safe supply of water.

Travellers' diarrhoea is also covered at fitfortravel. As well as the normal hygiene precautions, this outlines where vaccination or antibiotics may be used to good effect.

In the hierarchy of controls, the safest option is to eliminate the hazard. You therefore need a process in place to decide whether a journey is really necessary, and whether as much could be achieved by a letter, email, phone call or video conference. See www.eyenetwork.com for examples of how you can link between two and six sites together in one video conference.

Many of the human factors issues which made video conferencing unpopular have been ironed out with "telepresence", where the experience is more face-to-face, with all involved apparently sitting around the table, even though some may be at the other end of the planet. See here for examples.

Categories:
Safety, Features, Accident reduction