The occupational health collaboration between the City of Pargas and Pihlajalinna has created substantial results. In a year, the availability of preventive occupational health services has improved, the number of sickness absences has decreased, and supervisors have received effective support for maintaining their personnel’s work ability.
Paraisten kaupunki and Pihlajalinna
- Pargas (Parainen in Finnish) is a bilingual city with a population of 15,000 located in South West Finland.
- The City of Pargas has approximately 660 employees, half of whom work in education and training
- Targas’ occupational health collaboration with Pihlajalinna began on 1 January 2024. The occupational health collaboration focuses, in particular, on preventive occupational healthcare and work ability support.
- Pihlajalinna’s private clinic in Pargas offers in-person and remote services to city personnel in Finnish and Swedish.
The occupational health collaboration between the City of Pargas and Pihlajalinna is founded on a high level of trust built on the mutual interest to support employee well-being. When the collaboration began in January 2024, clear goals were set for occupational healthcare.
“Our key performance indicators are the number of sickness absences, healthy employees and work disability retirements. These figures have improved rapidly,” says Pia Hotanen, Occupational Health Coordinator of Pargas.
Before the collaboration, the average annual sickness absence rate among the employees of the City of Pargas was over 16 days. In 2024, the sickness absence rate dropped to 12.3 days per person. According to Keva’s statistics, the average sickness absence rate in the local government sector was 15.5 days in 2023.
Sickness absence as person-workdays at the City of Pargas
2023: 16
2024: 12,3
Change: 23 %
Number of helathy employees in 2024
City of Pargas employees: 44 %
Local goverment sector average: 20,9%
Successful occupational health collaboration is built on trust and dialogue
The outstanding results have been achieved through close cooperation between Pihlajalinna’s occupational health team and the city organisation of Pargas. An open and confidential dialogue is at the core of the successful partnership. The collaboration follows an annual planning cycle that details all the goals supporting occupational health and their target schedules.
“In addition to regular meetings, we have branched out and engaged representatives from various fields in the dialogue. Regular cooperation enhances transparency and creates a clear understanding of potential solutions,” says Annika Söderblom, City of Pargas’ Designated Occupational Health Nurse at Pihlajalinna.
Occupational health team familiar with the city organisation’s challenges
The City of Pargas has gone through significant organisational changes in recent years. For example, the new bilingual comprehensive school of approximately 760 students has created the city personnel new challenges that have been addressed through preventive occupational health services, such as a survey of the work environment’s impact on health and employee support measures.
“Pihlajalinna’s designated occupational health team has put its heart into learning about the personnel’s stress factors and established a clear procedure for solving problems,” Pia Hotanen praises Pihlajalinna.
Maija Sirén, Account Manager at Pihlajalinna, points out that preventive occupational healthcare is also a financially sound solution.
“It is important that we can present decision-makers numbers that demonstrate that preventive occupational health services are a cost-effective investment.”
Digital application facilitates work ability management
Pargas has the Sopiva service package, which is supplemented with certain specialist services. The occupational health team provides services in Finnish and Swedish.
“Offering services in both languages is important to us. Remote services are also crucial, as many employees live and work in the archipelago,” adds Hotanen.
In summer 2025, the supervisors and HR manager of the City of Pargas will start using the digital Työkyvyn tuki application. The application is a centralised and effective tool for managing work ability challenges. In the application, supervisors can easily, for example, address regular sickness absences and identify the need for early support.
“The application will certainly make contacting occupational health easier and lower the threshold for proposing occupational health negotiations, allowing us to take a genuine approach to finding alternatives to sickness absences. I am delighted that supervisors have already contacted occupational health without hesitation and asked for advice on work ability management,” says Söderblom.
Occupational health collaboration is founded on human encounters
The close collaboration between the City of Pargas and Pihlajalinna will continue, and the development of occupational health will remain as Pargas’ strategic focus. Pargas and Pihlajalinna will also respond rapidly to potential changes.
“The annual planning cycle serves as a framework for our collaboration and it can – and is allowed to – change. If the work community faces a crisis, or other acute needs arise, occupational health will react quickly and in a multidisciplinary manner,” Söderblom summarises the collaboration.
According to Pia Hotanen, the City of Pargas will invest more heavily in occupational well-being in future. For example, Pargas has hired an occupational well-being coordinator and launched a supervisor training programme for all supervisors. The aim of the training programme is to provide tools for occupational well-being and work ability management. In addition, city employees have been chosen for a test group for the Firstbeat Wellness Analysis.
“Our cooperation with Pihlajalinna has been unprejudiced and positive, and it has given us a boost forward. According to our experience, Pihlajalinna is genuinely interested in our operations and the people whose well-being is at the heart of our work.”