Introduction
The Resile team has been delivering a comprehensive suite of alcohol and other drug (AOD) management services to businesses and organisations for over 20 years.
As an alcohol and other drug service provider, we have an experienced multi-disciplinary team and several Medical Review Officers (MRO) available dependent on your organisation’s requirements.
They can provide services such as:
- Alcohol and other drugs consultations
- Medical Review Officer (MRO) Services
- Medication declarations and
- Repeat testing (on-site or clinic based).
Why do you need help with it?
Does your organisation conduct drug testing of your workforce? How do you manage non-negative cases?
Our multi-disciplinary team assists organisations to interpret results of alcohol and other drugs (AOD) and can provide answers to complex medical questions in relation to employee’s fitness for work.
Dependent on your organisation’s requirements, we have a team of Medical Review Officers (MRO) certified by Australasian Medical Review Officers Association (AMROA) available.
Your organisation will receive timely and clinically appropriate information to assist in the management of workers who have returned a non-negative AOD screen result.
We can:
- be available during business hours (and by special arrangement 24/7)
- be available anywhere in Australia, in person or via telemedicine
- validate the alcohol and drug test results
- instant advice on possible positives from genuine therapeutic use (not just taking the advice of the tester on declared medications)
- teleconsultation with employees for all non-negative initial test results
- provide an initial HR management report for non-negative initial test results
- were required, coordinate a drug or alcohol intervention program
- issue supplementary HR reports (if required)
- recommend follow-up testing and time period as necessary
- determine the employee’s fitness to resume performing, safety critical work
- issue clearance reports with follow-up recommendation (e.g. unannounced testing, re-training etc)
- determine whether genuine therapeutic use could be a health and safety risk.
- management and provision of after incident or reasonable suspicion drug and alcohol testing and
- confirmation testing.
Case Example
- an individual working in a Safety Sensitive Aviation Activity (SSAA) role, who tested non-negative for a substance that can be both prescribed and used as a substance of abuse.
- request via 24/7/365 urgent line with a request for MRO review and determination in relation to onsite AOD test results.
- within 30 minutes of receiving the referral, one of our MRO-certified doctors conducted a teleconsultation with the employee. A report was provided to the referrer within the hour, outlining a determination of fitness for SSAA duty and any other recommendations.
How does it work?
- non-routine testing
- in the event where an AOD test occurs outside the planned random testing protocol, our MRO’s can assist. Examples of such events include post incident, causal/on-suspicion testing, or testing that occurs while an employee is visiting a site that is managed, maintained or controlled by an alternate organisation; If you have a particular case that you want assistance with contact cases@resile.com.au
- scheduled unannounced testing
- our Medical Review Officers (MROs) can be available for all scheduled testing;If you want our specifically trained doctors or qualified MROs to be on call to respond to a non negative test from your planned testing onsite liaise with Cases Team on cases@resile.com.au to discuss your testing schedule
- management of complex cases
- cases requiring comprehensive assessment, case conferences or site visits may occur from time to time. These cases generally involve a comprehensive assessment by the Occupational Health Doctor (face to face) followed by a detailed report with recommendations for ongoing management. If you have a particular case that you want assistance with contact cases@resile.com.au
- additionally we offer consultancy services including
- review of existing policy and processes
- development and delivery of onsite and webinar education to all employees
- provision of education material to employees and managers
- review of all letter and communication templates
- delivery of refresher and or onboarding education and
- management and provision of random onsite drug and alcohol testing.
Medication Declaration
With an aging workforce and medical advances many of your employees will be using medications to manage a medical condition (either short or long term) or to maximise their health.
These medications may need to be declared as required by policies or legislation (such as the Rail Safety National Law) to enable a risk assessment to be facilitated, particularly for safety critical roles.
Our comprehensive Medication Declaration Assessment is designed to evaluate the potential impact of these declared medications on the employee’s ability to safely perform the inherent requirements of their role without significant risk to themselves or others.
Upon completion of the assessment, the employer, will receive detailed advice and recommendations regarding the employee’s fitness for duty. This will include an analysis of any potential risks and suggested measures to ensure both the safety and productivity of the workplace.
Case Example
- an employee working within the mining sector declared the use of a prescribed benzodiazepine medication
- a teleconsultation was arranged with one of our doctors
- teleconsultation includes:
- review of past medical history and details of prescribed medication
- discussion of dosage, frequency and any side effects
- proof of prescription
- consideration of appropriateness of prescription for treatment of reported condition
- assessment of the risk of medication-related impairment and the potential impact on the employee’s job performance, considering safety critical nature
- advice on the reporting and management of any potential side effects that may be associated with the medication prescribed
- following the teleconsultation a comprehensive report provided to the employer with information on the medication prescribed, recommendations, side effects reported (if any) and a determination on fitness for duty.
Within 24 hours from receipt of referral, this employer was able to swiftly and effectively assess the worker’s health and fitness for their role, while ensuring compliance with health and safety regulations.
How does the Medication Declaration work?
Depending on your organisations preference we can set up the following options for referral:
- employees can self-refer
- referral from a designated contact in your organisations for booked assessment
- urgent medication declaration via our 24/7 telemedicine service.
Once the referral is received, a teleconsultation with your worker will be booked where the doctor will
- review medications in consultation with the worker
- document medical conditions medications are treating
- brief verbal feedback provided to the employee and
- report sent to employer.
FAQs
No they will not, the report to the employer will not disclose the particular medication or the medical condition it is being used to treat.
The report to the employer will advise that you have returned a confirmed positive result and that you are not fit for safety critical work and advise a retest timeframe. The outcome of this will depend on your employers’ policies and procedures.
The doctor who conducts a teleconsultation with you will ask for a copy of the prescription or a photo of the medication packaging showing the pharmacy label.
Most medication will not impact your fitness for work, however if it is determined there is a risk your employer will be advised that you are temporarily unfit for safety critical work.
The use of medicinal cannabis has increased in recent years. For medicinal cannabis containing THC the advice will be that this is a risk for safety critical work and the individual is not safe to do safety critical work temporarily.
It is worth noting that in most states that having medicinal cannabis in your system and testing positive (regardless of whether it is prescribed or not) is illegal a violation of road safety legislation.
This is a changing landscape and we update our advice according to the most recent research and legislative changes.
The report to the employer will contain:
- the name of the worker and one other identifier
- the result of the screening and confirmation test (not what medication the test result was for)
- recommendations for:
- fitness for work
- retesting
- formal intervention (if required).
Yes and no. Many prescribed medications represent a risk for safety critical work. Medicinal cannabis is just one of those, the difference with medicinal cannabis is that road rules in Australia preclude the use of any THC containing substance.
No. The medical condition and the medication will not be declared to the employer only the impact on risk for safety critical work and any recommendations Resile provides.
