Continuing care staff at Tabor Village have cause to celebrate after experiencing an unprecedented four months without any time loss claims. Tabor Village, a campus of care managed by Tabor Home Society in Abbotsford, is one of many care homes using innovative methods to create a positive workplace health and safety culture after graduating from SafeCare BC’s “Peer Resource Network.”

The Peer Resource Network, a joint initiative between SafeCare BC and WorkSafeBC, focuses on Occupational Health and Safety through the lens of peer-to-peer learning.

Each Network moves collectively through a series of workshops focused on promoting a mature safety culture in continuing care, reducing injury rates, and improving practices associated with employees returning to work. The program also connects leadership teams with external resources to support positive change in OH&S best practices.

Tabor Village fully embraced a “Healing at Work” philosophy after participating in the Peer program in the fall of 2015, including two sessions on return-to-work practices. The sessions, which were lead by WorkSafeBC, identified the key elements of an effective graduated return-to-work and stay-at-work program.

Participants were particularly interested to learn that injured workers can get their first physio appointment covered by WorkSafeBC, regardless of whether their time loss claim is ultimately accepted.

“Its made a big difference knowing how many different tools we have to prevent time-loss claims following an injury” said Corina Castronuovo, Director of Human Resources at Tabor Village. “We know that all good things come to an end eventually, but we are thrilled with our achievement over those four months –  we celebrated at all 3 locations to recognize the staff for their amazing accomplishment.”

SafeCare BC continues its work with the Peer Resource Network through monthly teleconference calls with its graduated participants. SafeCare BC will also be starting the program again with a new network of safety champions in early 2017.