“Occupational health should aim at the promotion and maintenance of the highest degree of physical, mental and social well-being of workers in all occupations; the prevention amongst workers of departures from health caused by their working conditions; the protection of workers in their employment from risks resulting from factors adverse to health; the placing and maintenance of the worker in an occupational environment adapted to his physiological and psychological capabilities; and, to summarize: the adaptation of work to man and of each man to his job.”

Occupational health services are services established in or near a place of employment or at a designated health facility for the purposes of:

• protecting the workers against any health hazard that may arise out of their work or the conditions in which it is carried on
• contributing towards the workers’ physical and mental adjustment, in particular by the adaptation of the work to the workers and their assignment to jobs for which they are suited
• contributing to the establishment and maintenance of the highest possible degree of physical and mental well-being of the workers

The WHO Regional Office for Europe (Rantanen,1990) identified the following principles as objectives of occupational health practice:

• protecting workers’ health against hazards at work (the protection and prevention principle)
• adapting work and the work environment to the capabilities of workers (the adaptation principle)
• enhancing the physical, mental and social well-being of workers (the health promotion principle)
• minimizing the consequences of occupational hazards, accidents and injuries, and occupational and work-related diseases (the cure and rehabilitation principle)
• providing general health care services for workers and their families, both curative and preventive, at the workplace or from nearby facilities (the general primary health care principle)