Answer:
- Annual periodic health examinations for Employees
Pursuant to the Law on Labour Safety and Hygiene, an Employer must hold periodic health examinations for Employees at least once a year, and at least once every 6 months for any Employee doing a job with heavy, toxic, and dangerous or extremely heavy, toxic, and dangerous nature, disable Employees, Employee under 18 years of age and old Employees[1]. As such, it is mandatory for the Employer to carry out annual periodic health examinations for the Employees.
2. Do Employees who have submitted health certificates upon recruitment have to participate in the periodic health examination in the same year?
In reality, the Employer pays much attention to the health examination of the Employees. Besides holding the annual periodic health examination for the Employees as required by law, most Employers also require the Employees to have their health examined before recruiting them. Normally, an Employee will be required to submit his or her health certificate in attachment to the application dossier to the Employer. The point of this requirement is to check the Employee’s general health and ensure that he or she is healthy enough for the position. However, there are cases where the Employee has had his or her health examined upon submitting the application dossier and then is recruited by the Employer before the periodic health examination of such enterprise in the same year. In this case, does the Employee have to participate in the periodic health examination held by the Employer in that year?
Currently, when conducting a health examination upon recruitment as well as a periodic health examination, an Employee is required to pass through a series of health examination items at a medical consulting or treating establishment which has been licensed and qualified as prescribed in Circular 14/2013/TT-BYT of the Ministry of Health.[2] Regarding the contents of a health examination upon recruitment and periodic health examination specified in Article 6.3 Circular 14/2013/TT-BYT which prescribes the Employees will have their health examined according to contents in the health examination book sample. For other cases of health examination with respect to the people over 18 years of age, they will have their health examined according to the contents in the health examination form used for people of at least 18 years of age if they are not the subjects who must have their health examined according to specialised health standards or specific requirements. In addition, there are circumstances where the Employer may require other specific examination contents, the Employees will then require the medical consulting or treating establishment to examine their health according to these contents.
After completing the items of health examination, the qualified medical consulting or treating establishment will grant health certificates to the Employees which are valid for 12 months from the date of signing the health conclusion[3]. However, technically, these are two different health examinations with separate contents and requirements. Also, the law does not prescribe clearly that any Employee who has just passed the health examination upon recruitment will be exempt from the annual periodic health examination of the enterprise in the same year. Therefore, there is no legal ground for the Employee to be exempt from the annual periodic health examination of the enterprise in that year even though he or she has passed the health examination upon recruitment and his or her health certificate is still valid. However, if the date of the annual periodic health examination is before the official working date, the Employee will not have to re-examine his or her health in that year.
[1] Article 21.1 of Law on Labour Safety and Hygiene
[2] Article 1.4 of Circular 14/2013/TT-BYT of Ministry of Health dated 06 May 2013
[3] Article 8.3(a) of Circular 14/2013/TT-BYT of Ministry of Health dated 06 May 2013
