EXECUTIVES’ HEALTH LONDON CLINIC KEEPS THE BOARD-ROOM CORONARY AT BAY

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30802, 14 July 1965, Page 14

EXECUTIVES’ HEALTH LONDON CLINIC KEEPS THE BOARD-ROOM CORONARY AT BAY

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"Financial Times"

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/Reprinted from the "Financial Times” bp arrangement.l The chib atmosphere starts with the elegant brass knocker on the discreet door of the mews house behind Belgrave Square. London. 1 pstairs, the greysuited middle aged man, lounging comfortably in a deep, gold damask covered armchair, his feel stretched out on the thick carpet, looks all but preparing for a stomach X-rav. Only the copies of " I he Family Doctor” lying on a small, antique table by the window, and the row of bottles filled with low-calorie health drinks beckoning from a shelf near the door give a slight indication that this is. in fact, a medical waiting room.

“It is this atmosphere the executives probably like most about us,” confesses Dr. Beric Wright, in charge of the Institute of Directors’ medical centre, which endowed with £15.000 worth of equipment, opened its doors just over 12 months ago. By now the clinic's eight part-time doctors, pilus one radiologist, are de-coking businessmen and. increasingly, their wives, too, at the rate of 2000 a year, and the centre is already set for expansion. Companies’ Schemes Second to the club atmosphere, top executives evidently revel in being encouraged to talk about themselves. “It is absolutely marvellous here,” said the grey-suited man without much prompting. “You get a positive answer—thej’ investigate your whole life since childhood.” At the same time, it seems, this man’s nervous dyspepsia is now going to be taken seriously w-hile the doctors in Harley Street, he insisted, could never be bothered about it. Of course, executive health charting is quite a different undertaking from treating really sick people. A man may be told that he is too old to get a new job at 45. but if he is already occupying a seat of responsibility at that age, he is regarded as a very valuable person. So there is not only the Institute of Directors to watch over his health. Most of the major companies, and a good

many smaller ones, have by now instituted health schemes of their own, specially tailored to the physical maintenance needs of senior executives.

However, these schemes rarely amount to health regimentation on the United States pattern. Most place much emphasis on being purely voluntary Imperial Chemical Industries’ London headquarters, and a number of its divisions, operate voluntary examinations by visiting consultants of the over-forties in executive positions. No subsequent report is made to the personnel director on the main board who issues the invitations. At “Shell," too there is 'no compulsion, but it is expected of all senior executives to undergo a check every two years.

This is, in fact often held up as a grave disadvantage of ‘top-hat” health schemes. Annual check-ups, some people maintain, create neuroses ‘■‘The dread of ill-health is more common in Britain than ill-health itself,” js the view of at least one physician. Artificial Neuroses However, the believers in “top-hat” schemes argue that there is no evidence for neuroses being artificially created. “This is only what the old boys of Harley street say." The multiplication of the company schemes, as well as the success of the Directors’ clinic, with all the expense this involves, seem to prove the pundits right. Indeed, from dealing solely with individuals, the centre in Belgrave Mews has moved on to treating whole groups of executives from 98 companies—“from the biggest to the smallest.’’ It likes it this way. Regular health maintenance of a group of executives, a working unit, means insight into the climate of their company, “which we can influence for the benefit of the individuals and the organisation of which they are a vital part." The centre's charge for half-a-day’s initial routine examinations is 20 guineas for; members of the Institute of Directors, and 25 guineas fori non-members who are notnin-1 ated by their companies.!

Periodic repeat visits cost 16 guineas.

Apart from sorting the executives into risk categories the first examination is regarded as a “baseline.” against which subsequent changes in health can be measured. As it is coronary thrombosis and high blood pressure which, to the detriment of their employers, tend to "cut down people who are still in their prime," and also because their causes seem to be related to a man’s way of life and are therefore controllable, these two diseases are mainly looked at. Commonest Disease So, probing into the executive's family background .s accompanied by taking his (weight “Obesity is the commonest disease in developed countries —the mortality rate goes up 13 per cent for every 10 per cent overweight,” is the contention. Of one sample of 500 people examined (they were all above the age of 40) a third were 10 or 20 per cent overweight

Then comes the blood pressure. “Lung cancel- is the least of reasons for not (smoking cigarettes—even time you smoke one your blood pressure goes up 1* points." and high blood pres sure, in turn, is directly related to weight—and tends to lead to strokes, brain haemor rhage. thrombosis and coronaries. Just how much exercise a man takes is also investigated. as is the level of his blood cholesterol . . . and about 10 per cent of the executives thus examined in the news house off Belgrave square need additional consultations.

However, looking at the bright side, most of what comes to light during these examinations are factors controllable by the individual himself, by his boss, or by medicine. The executive can deal with his weight and his smoking habits: his boss can make life less strenuous for him: his blood pressure can be brought down by drugs. The main thing, it seems, is to catch him young. This, of course, is also in the best interest of business—for all concerned.