Supporting healthy ageing at work: managing less visible aspects of healthy ageing at work

Description

BSG Conference 2022 - SHAW abstract
Supporting healthy ageing at work: managing less visible aspects of healthy ageing at work

One in three workers in the UK are aged 50+, a figure that is set to rise in coming decades. Almost half of those aged 50-64 have at least one long-term health condition. For 1 in 5 older workers who stop working before State Pension Age, health problems are the main reason why they left their job. However, with the right workplace supports in place, health need not be the main barrier for older people to be able to remain in work.

The Supporting Healthy Ageing at Work (SHAW) study adopts a co-design approach to involve older workers in the development and testing of a range of innovative workplace health interventions to support the health and well-being of workers over 50. The SHAW study is working with three case study partner organisations in finance, manufacturing and social care sectors, and a group of self-employed individuals.

This presentation offers an overview of emergent findings from Stage 1 of the research, a qualitative dataset collected via 132 in-depth, semi-structured interviews with workers over 50. Interviews focused particularly on ‘hidden health’ issues that are often overlooked in workplace health interventions, addressing issues including: menopause; cognitive ageing; mental health and well-being; financial well-being; and health implications of juggling paid work and informal care. Findings extend to transversal themes of line manager efficacy, psychological safety, internalised ageism, participants’ neo-liberal view of health and variability of organisational support. We also consider the impact of Covid on how healthy ageing at work is, and can be, supported.

250 words

Period	8 Jul 2022
Event title	British Society of Gerontology Annual Conference 2022
Event type	Conference
Degree of Recognition	National