A few months ago I met an aged care worker I’ll call Dee. She’d hurt her shoulder transferring a resident, and by the time I got the referral she’d been off for seven weeks. Nobody from work had rung her in that time, apart from payroll. She’d started to wonder if she still had a job. She told me she’d stopped driving past the facility because it made her stomach turn.
Her shoulder was actually healing fine. What had gone wrong was everything around it.
I’ve worked in occupational rehabilitation for a long time, and Dee’s story is a common one. If you’re an injured worker, a supervisor or a small business owner who’s just had your first workers’ comp claim land on your desk, here’s what rehab actually involves and why it’s worth doing properly.
What occupational rehab actually is
The short version: it’s the work of getting an injured or unwell person back to safe, productive work, ideally their own job, as soon as their recovery allows.
That’s done by a workplace rehabilitation provider. Most of us come from allied health. We’re occupational therapists, physios, exercise physiologists, psychologists and rehab counsellors. We usually get involved through a workers’ compensation claim. The scheme depends on your state, so it might be icare, WorkSafe, WorkCover or ReturnToWorkSA. Some employers also bring us in for injuries that happened outside work, because they’d rather have someone back than keep the position empty.
Day to day, my job is mostly unglamorous. I visit worksites to see what the job really involves. I talk to GPs about what the worker can do, not just what they can’t. I write up duties plans, run case conferences and make a lot of phone calls, because someone has to keep the worker, the doctor, the employer and the insurer pointed in the same direction. Left alone, they drift.
We’re not there to rush anyone back. We’re also not there to keep someone home “until they’re 100 per cent.” There’s a lot of ground between those two, and that’s where most recovery happens.
The first few weeks matter more than people think
If I could change one habit in Australian workplaces, it’d be the silence in the first fortnight.
Someone gets hurt. The employer, worried about saying the wrong thing, says nothing. The worker sits at home in pain, reading forums at 2am and building a story where the boss doesn’t care and they’ll be pushed out. By week six they’ve stopped being a worker with a sore shoulder. They’re a person with a claim, and that’s a much harder thing to come back from.
The longer someone’s off, the harder the road back gets. It’s one of the most consistent patterns in this field, and I see it every month. Physical injuries that should take eight weeks turn into eight months because people lose their routine, their confidence and their sense of belonging somewhere.
If you manage people, a phone call in the first week makes a real difference. It doesn’t need to be clever. “How are you going? We want you back when you’re ready. What do you need?” That call has saved more claims than any report I’ve written.
Suitable duties, done properly
Suitable duties are the backbone of most rehab plans. They’re temporary work that fits within what the doctor has cleared. Depending on your state, that clearance is written on a certificate of capacity or a work capacity certificate.
Done well, suitable duties keep you in your routine, near your workmates and earning your normal wage, while your body heals. Done badly, they’re humiliating.
I’ve seen a diesel mechanic put in a back room to sort screws for three weeks. I’ve seen a nurse told to sit in the staffroom “until something comes up.” Both were back on their GP’s doorstep within a fortnight, asking to be signed off totally unfit. Can you blame them?
Good suitable duties tend to have a few things in common:
- They’re real work. The task needs doing, and somebody would notice if it didn’t get done.
- They’re close to the normal job. A truck driver might do yard checks, dispatch or train a new starter, instead of filing.
- They change. Hours and tasks step up as recovery goes on, with review dates written into the plan.
- Everyone knows about them. That includes the supervisor and the team, so nobody makes snide comments about “light duties.”
For Dee, we worked out a plan with her facility. She started on four-hour shifts doing medication rounds, lifestyle activities and resident paperwork, with no manual handling. Within six weeks she was back on the floor with a modified load. It wasn’t complicated. It just needed someone to organise it.
What’s in it for the workplace
Employers sometimes see rehab as a cost forced on them by the insurer. I understand that, especially if you run a small business. Here’s how I’d frame it instead.
A worker on suitable duties is still contributing. A worker at home is a vacancy you’re paying for, plus overtime or agency staff to cover it. Long claims also tend to push up your workers’ comp premium. In most schemes, how quickly and safely you get people back affects what you pay.
There’s also your team. Other staff watch closely how an injured colleague gets treated. If someone gets hurt and the business looks after them and brings them back properly, people notice. If someone gets hurt and quietly disappears, people notice that too, and they’ll remember it the next time they’re deciding whether to report a near miss.
And rehab often turns up problems you didn’t know you had. Plenty of my worksite visits for one injury have ended with a conversation about a bench height, a lifting process or a roster that was going to hurt someone else eventually.
Things people get wrong
“The rehab provider works for the insurer.” We’re often referred by the insurer, sure. But our job is a safe, lasting return to work, and that’s in the worker’s interest more than anyone’s. If you feel like your provider isn’t listening, say so. You’re allowed to raise it.
“You can’t go back until you’re fully healed.” For most injuries, that’s not how recovery works. The right kind of activity, including work, is part of getting better. Your GP sets the limits. We work inside them.
“We’re too small to offer suitable duties.” Small businesses are often better at it than big ones, because the owner can be flexible. When there’s genuinely nothing available, some schemes support host placements with another employer. Ask.
“Rehab is only for serious injuries.” Some of the best results I see come from getting involved early in fairly ordinary cases, like a sprained wrist or a back strain, before they turn into something bigger.
“Psychological injuries are a different beast, so leave them alone.” They do take more care, and the relationship with the workplace often matters more. But leaving them alone is usually the worst option.
What makes rehab work, and what doesn’t
When rehab goes well, I usually see the same things. Someone at the workplace owns the process. The GP is kept informed and asked specific questions. The worker has a say in their own plan. Duties are written down, reviewed and upgraded on time.
When it goes badly, it’s usually because communication has broken down. The supervisor hasn’t read the plan. The worker hears about changes second-hand. Three different people are giving three different messages. Or nobody wants to have an honest conversation about whether the original job is still realistic. Sometimes it isn’t, and the sooner that’s discussed, the more options there are for retraining or redeployment.
Rehab isn’t magic. It’s mostly good organisation, honest conversations and a bit of persistence.
If you’re dealing with it now
If you’re injured, keep your appointments, ask your GP what you can do, and stay in touch with work, even if it’s just a text. If you’re an employer, ring your worker this week, talk to your insurer about getting a rehab provider involved early, and start thinking about what useful duties you could offer.
Dee’s been back on full duties for a while now. Her shoulder’s fine. The thing she still mentions is that seven-week silence. A single phone call in week one would have changed how the whole claim felt.
Here at Strive Occupational Rehabilitation, we can help you with all of this. Get in contact here for all your Brisbane, Toowoomba, Townsville, Cairns and Gold Coast occupational rehabilitation needs:
