Fitness-for-duty research earns best paper award
News Item
- Date:
- 22 July, 2009
DSTO scientist, Dr Daniel Billing has been awarded Best Defence and Veteran Health Paper at the inaugural South Australian Defence and Veterans Health Research Paper Day for his research into physical employment standards for the Australian Army.
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- Dan Billing, presented with his award for Best Defence and Veteran Health Paper by MAJGEN Jeffrey Rosenfeld, Surgeon General Defence Health Reserves
Dr Billing leads a team of human performance specialists whose work is aimed at developing minimum fitness-for-duty assessments that adequately represent the physical requirements of service in the Australian Army.
The Army currently has only one physical standard that applies to all solders and is used to indicate individual readiness for both ongoing employment and deployment. That standard, called a Basic Fitness Assessment (BFA), involves three activities - a 2.4 km run, push ups and sit ups. The standard that must be reached is calibrated depending on age and gender.
According to Dr Billing, this standard does not accurately measure a soldier's readiness or suitability to perform the myriad jobs that make up the Australian Army in the 21st Century. Nor is it appropriate for the standards to be calibrated according to age or gender.
"In the Army, a job needs to be done regardless of age or gender, so to have standards that are referenced by these factors is not appropriate in the military environment," Dr Billing explains.
"We have a situation where soldiers can be identified as not being capable of performing their job based on their BFA results, when in reality they may be highly capable of the specific tasks associated with their trade.
"Conversely, soldiers may be identified as job-capable by passing the BFA, but they are not, because the BFA is not related to specific job requirements.
"By establishing physical employment standards representative of military tasks, we can ensure that all soldiers regardless of trade classifications, rank, age, or gender have the physical capacity commensurate with the performance of critical tasks."
In addition to significantly reducing OHS, healthcare and compensation claims, it is believed the adoption of employment standards will assist in guiding recruits into occupations for which they are most physically suited, potentially open up occupations that have traditionally been closed to certain groups and assist in member retention.
Dr Billing's paper was one of more than 20 research projects submitted for the inaugural paper day from some of Australia’s leading researchers.
A paper on diabetes screening presented by endocrinologist Morton Burt was judged Best Scientific Paper.
The Defence and Veterans Health Research Paper Day was instigated by Foundation Daw Park, established in the 1990’s by veterans to provide funding, facilities and equipment to support world-class medical research and patient care at the Repatriation General Hospital in Daw Park, South Australia.
Foundation Daw Park Executive Director Chris Jenner said the research paper day was a key step in establishing a Defence and Veteran Health Fund to work in conjunction with, and as an extension of existing funding of medical research and patient care facilities at Repatriation General Hospital.
‘The new fund will be a focal point for research associated with the health and wellbeing of war veterans, and a way for the community to demonstrate their appreciation of and support of today’s veterans, and those of the future,’ she said.
The Defence Science and Technology Organisation (DSTO) is part of Australia's Department of Defence. DSTO's role is to ensure the expert, impartial and innovative application of science and technology to the defence of Australia and its national interests.