All posts by Kit Case

DLI

Return To Work is a Program; Return To Function is a Philosophy

Title: “Expression of pain” – Chris JL

Today’s post comes from workerscompensation.com, one of the blogs that I follow.  I am taking Bob’s advice and sharing his article with our network.  His concepts are spot-on.

I wish I had thought of the two concepts reflected in the title of this article. Alas, I did not. I did, however, once again take two dynamite ideas, combine them into one cohesive concept, thereby saving the universe while still managing to create an enticing, killer headline in the process.

I swear, sometimes it’s exhausting being me.

I now serve on the Disability Management & Return to Work Committee of the International Association of Industrial Accident Boards and Commissions (IAIABC). We met Tuesday during the associations 99th Annual Convention in San Diego, CA. Committee Chair Peter Federko tasked the group with defining a working strategy that would encourage and promote successful disability management and return to work programs for both the industry and injured workers. This prompted what I can best describe as a passionate discussion among the members, each with their own take and view on where barriers exist, and what segments should be targeted in any RTW effort. 

Federko, who by day is CEO of the Saskatchewan Workers’ Compensation Board, did a masterful job of keeping the conversation focused as we rambled about with our various opinions. Personally I believe that there are many “moving parts” within workers’ compensation that all must be aligned and engaged to effectively deploy any respectable RTW program. It requires a team effort from all players. Unfortunately, our current trend in claims management is taking us towards a dehumanization of the process, and this is not conducive for the development of such initiatives. 

Two members of this group gave what I believe to be stunning insight, and not just because they dovetail nicely with my beliefs (ok, mostly because they dovetail nicely with my beliefs). Joachim (pronounced Yoke-em) Breuer, with the German workers’ comp system and Chair of the ISSA Technical Commission on Accident Insurance, provided tremendous insight when he stated that Return to Work was not a program, but rather a philosophy; a philosophy that needed to be ingrained throughout the workers’ compensation system. He was followed in short order by Ken Eichler, Director of Government & Insurance Services, Guidelines Division, for Reed Group. Eichler, who is also Committee Vice Chair, talked of suspicion and resistance on the side of the injured worker. He suggested that, to allay fears that RTW was merely a cleverly disguised cost control scheme, the committee instead develop criteria for a “Return to Function” program. He correctly pointed out that “function” is at the core of all life necessities, and that if we can focus on improving that for injured workers, return to work would be a natural extension of any successful effort. 

Brilliant observations from both of them. Federko immediately instructed each to take an extra thousand out of petty cash for their input (not really – I made that up. Ever the cost control maven, Federko wouldn’t even open the committee liquor cabinet). Still, this theory was not quite complete. We haven’t quite finished mixing all ingredients for our RTW stew. We still have one more to add.

As you may notice, both suggestions by Eichler and Breuer fit quite nicely with my (as yet unsuccessful) effort to reposition and rebrand the workers’ compensation industry into the Workers’ Recovery industry. We will therefore include that as a third element in the recipe. This concoction produces the following final scrumptious result:

Successful Return to Function must be driven as an overriding philosophy ingrained throughout the Workers’ Recovery system.

There. Not too shabby if I do say so myself. 

The philosophy maintains that we must return as many people as possible to functional capacity for as normal a life as possible. Severely injured workers almost without exception wish to have some normalcy in their life. They have children or grandchildren they hope to hold. They want to dress, walk or go to the bathroom without assistance. They want to be able to do their own shopping, and they literally would like to be able to take a moment, bend over, and smell the roses. An entire system that embraces that knowledge, from employers, TPA’s, brokers, carriers, doctors, regulators and the workers themselves, can improve both outcomes and individual lives. With that return to function we offer a return to normalcy, a return to life, and indeed, a return to work. 

I cannot speak for the committee nor do I even wish to reveal the path we ultimately chose. Suffice it to say we’re on the right track, and have an amazing amount of work ahead of us. But it will be worth it, as it needs to happen. The current trends are not sustainable. Disability rates are on a dramatic rise, being completely dependent on others is becoming socially normalized, and as workers we are getting older by the day. Our knees are wearing out. Our backs are starting to fail. Many of us have no appreciable skills beyond our current jobs. It is a recipe for disaster if we don’t act, and act quickly.

Restoring life and viability by returning to function via the process of workers’ recovery must be the wave of the future. The choice is simple. Embrace the philosophy today or pay for the reality tomorrow. 

What choice will we make?

Photo credit: Chris JL / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-ND

Breast Cancer

Scientific Study Linking Breast Cancer and Work Wins APHA Award

Today’s post comes from guest author Jon Gelman, from Jon L Gelman LLC.

This is a fascinating study, with potentially far-reaching implications for women and their families.

The scientific study linking the causal relationship of breast cancer to the occupational exposure of endocrine disrupters has been awarded the Anerican Public Health Association Scientific Award. It is anticipated that this sentinal studiy will provide additional scientific evidence in the courtroom to support the compensability of breast cancer as an occupational illness. Today’s post is shared from biomedcentral.com .

Every year the American Public Health Association honours the achievements of scientific researchers for efforts towards improving public health. This year the winners of the APHA Scientific Award, announced today in Boston, USA, are James Brophy and Andrew Watterson from the University of Stirling, UK, and colleagues, for two outstanding research articles on environmental factors contributing to breast cancer risk. Both articles were published last year; one in New Solutions and one in Environmental Health, the latter titled ‘Breast cancer risk in relation to occupations with exposure to carcinogens and endocrine disruptors: a Canadian case control study’.

“As researchers and public health advocates we are delighted with this recognition from what is the oldest and most noteworthy public health association in the world”, said Brophy. “This Award will encourage a closer examination of the breast cancer risks faced by countless women employed in a host of chemical-laden industries and will advance the development of precautionary strategies.”

In their study in Environmental Health, Brophy and colleagues analysed over 1000 cases of breast cancer and over 1000 controls in Southern Ontario, Canada, each with detailed occupational and reproductive histories. Their findings revealed that across all occupational sectors, from farming and plastics manufacturing to food canning and gambling/bars, women with potentially high exposures to endocrine disrupters and carcinogens for a period of ten years showed an increased risk for breast cancer.

Since the publication of their articles, further studies have continued to explore how breast cancer risk is impacted by a variety of factors, as Watterson recounts: “The research has been followed in the last year with scientific papers discussing breast cancer and shift/night work, and breast cancer and its links with cadmium exposures, endocrine disruptors and pesticide applications. Additional research on chemicals used in the plastics industry linked to breast cancer has revolved around endocrine disruptors and there is much going on with regard to risk assessments, for example, of BPA.”

Click here to read the entire article.

 

Workers' Compensation

A History of Workers’ Compensation – With a Washington State Slant

English Fire Insurance Laws Enacted in 1667

c2000, BC

Hammurabi, ruler of Babylon, was responsible for the Code of Hammurabi, part of which bears resemblance to today’s workers’ compensation laws.

c460-c377, BC

Hippocrates, the father of contemporary medicine, established .a link between the respiratory problems of Greek stonecutters and the rock dust surrounding them.

1667

The Great Fire of London (September 2-7, 1666) caused the first English fire insurance laws to be enacted.

1880

William Gladstone pushes Employers’ Liability Act in Britain

1864

The Pennsylvania Mine Safety Act (PMSA) was passed into law.

1871

Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince of Bismarck, Duke of Lauenburg, (known as Otto von Bismarck, a Prussian statesman) enacts the Employers’ Liability Act.

1877

The state of Massachusetts passed a law requiring guarding for dangerous machinery, and took authority for enforcement of factory inspection programs.

1878

The first recorded call by a labor organization for a federal occupational safety and health law is heard.

1884

Otto von Bismarck enacts Workers’ Accident Insurance

1902

The state of Maryland passed the first workers’ compensation law.

1911

Industrial Insurance laws enacted in Washington State.

1911 – 1915

During this period, 30 states passed workers’ compensation laws.

1968

President Lyndon Johnson called for a federal occupational safety and health law.

1970

President Richard Nixon signed into law the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA), thus creating the OSH Administration and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).

1972

Self-Insurance for Workers’ Compensation allowed for individual businesses in Washington State.

2012

Compromise and Release Structured Settlement Agreements allowed for certain Washington State workers’ compensation claims that meet basic criteria.

 

Uncategorized

Johnson & Johnson to reportedly pay $4B in hip implant lawsuit

Today’s post was shared by The Workers’ Injury Law & Advocacy Group and comes from www.chicagotribune.com

CT sc-nw-1016-medical-device-tax MJW

CT sc-nw-1016-medical-device-tax MJW

Johnson & Johnson will pay more than $4 billion to settle thousands of lawsuits over its recalled defective hip implants, Bloomberg reported late on Tuesday, citing three people familiar with the deal.

Johnson & Johnson declined to comment on the report.

The deal will resolve more than 7,500 lawsuits brought against J&J’s DePuy orthopedics unit in federal and state courts by patients who have already had the defective devices removed, the report said.

De Puy recalled thousands of its metal ASR hip systems due to higher-than-expected failure rates. Plaintiffs claim that defective metal-on-metal devices caused pain, discomfort and more serous complications, including increased levels of metal ions in the bloodstream.

The devices were introduced in the United States in 2005, and DePuy recalled the product in 2010 after selling an estimated 93,000 units worldwide. Data from the UK at the time showed that about 12 percent of the implants needed to be replaced after five years.

Metal implants were developed to be more durable than traditional hip implants, which combine a ceramic or metal ball with a plastic socket. All-metal implants can shed metallic debris, potentially damaging bone and soft tissue, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

[Click here to see the original post]

Uncategorized

Macy’s Joining Wal-Mart on Thanksgiving Energizes Labor

Today’s post was shared by Gelman on Workplace Injuries and comes from www.bloomberg.com

Macy’s Inc. (M), whose annual Manhattanparade is a cherished Thanksgiving tradition for millions, isstarting a new holiday ritual: It’s asking its employees to showup for work.

Pressured by competition, a shorter shopping season andlackluster consumer spending, at least a dozen U.S. mega-retailers are opening for the first time on Thanksgiving Day,such as Macy’s, or opening earlier that day than in previousyears. They are following Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT), the largest U.S.employer, which has been open for business on Thanksgiving formore than 25 years.

“Another holiday bites the dust in favor of retailers,”Candace Corlett, president of New York consulting firm WSLStrategic Retail, said in a Nov. 12 phone interview. “Ourculture now is to shop, and to get the best deals. Thanksgivingas a day of rest was another culture, another time, not today.”

The expansion of hours will take more than a millionemployees away from their families during the holiday. Organizedlabor has been encouraging low-wage employees to join unions foryears to stem membership losses, and now wants to use theThanksgiving hours to encourage workers to band together toimprove working conditions.

“It plays into the larger themes that we’ve been pushingaround low-wage workers who don’t have a lot of job security,”Amaya Smith, a spokeswoman for the AFL-CIO, said in aninterview. “Thanksgiving, Black Friday is one example of oneholiday…

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Disability, Health, health insurance, Uncategorized, Work Injury, Worker Safety, Workers' Compensation

How Safe Is Healthcare for Workers?

Today’s post comes from guest author Rod Rehm, from Rehm, Bennett & Moore.

The issue raised by Mr. Rehm was investigated thoroughly in a book given to us by a client, an injured nurse who contributed her story to the effort under a pseudonym: Back Injury Among Healthcare Workers, published by Lewis Publishers. It is a great resource, providing case-studies, statistics and suggestions for improvements for workers in the healthcare field.

The article that today’s blog post is based upon is an in-depth look at how one state’s OSHA office interacts with a sector of the healthcare community: hospitals. Like Iowa, but unlike Nebraska, Oregon is one of 27 states or U.S. territories that has an OSHA office at the state level. 

The “Lund Report: Unlocking Oregon’s Healthcare System” article talks extensively about nuances within ways that OSHA offices, whether state or federal, can measure the safety of healthcare providers like hospitals and nursing homes. 

As evidenced in previous blog posts about senior-care workers and lifting injuries, I have continuing concerns for the safety of healthcare workers. 

According to the in-depth article, “A Lund Report review suggests that in Oregon, regulators are de-emphasizing attention to hospital employee safety, despite national data showing that healthcare workers are injured in the U.S. each year at rates similar to farmers and hunters. Most Oregon hospitals have not been inspected by the state Occupational Safety and Health Division in years. And when on-the-job hazards are detected, Oregon’s OSHA office levies the lowest average penalties in the country.”

Should workers get lost as the patients are the focus of these healthcare institutions? Should regulation and inspections or fines by such groups as OSHA be the driving force toward workplace safety for healthcare employees?

It seems to me that healthcare administrators’ emphasis on profit is more important than proper concern for their employees – the nation’s caregivers. And if you or your family member is the healthcare worker who gets hurt on the job, this lack of focus on the worker is more than just a philosophical argument.

Uncategorized

Yelp Reviewers File Class-Action Lawsuit Claiming They Are Unpaid Writers

Today’s post was shared by The Workers’ Injury Law & Advocacy Group and comes from www.huffingtonpost.com.

My question: if an Elite reviewer is found to be an employee of Yelp, do they then have exposure to workers’ compensation claims?

A group of irate reviewers have sued Yelp, claiming that they are unpaid writers who are vital to the company’s existence.

The plaintiffs filed a California class action lawsuit in Los Angeles on October 22, referring to themselves as writers and non-wage paid employees at the review site who have earned the company huge sums of money.

“The practice of classifying employees as ‘reviewers’ or ‘Yelpers’ or ‘Elites’ or ‘independent contractors’ or ‘interns’ or ‘volunteers’ or ‘contributors’ to avoid paying wages is prohibited by federal law, which requires employers to pay all workers who provide material benefit to their employer, at least the minimum wage,” the lawsuit reads.

The plaintiffs also claim to have been unjustly “fired” by Yelp when their accounts were suspended, and that they were pressured by the site to write more reviews in order to remain “Elite” Yelpers, a designation the site awards its most active and followed reviewers.

“In order to maintain her ‘Elite’ status, (plaintiff Lily Jeung) was often directed to write more reviews if in Yelp’s opinion her production seemed to slack off,” the lawsuit contends. “Ms. Jeung was fired from her position with no warning, a flimsy explanation, and no opportunity for recourse or appeal rights. Her license to write reviews was revoked; the awards she had attained were taken away;…

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Uncategorized

Neuroscience may offer hope to millions robbed of silence by tinnitus

An MRI of the brain of a chronic tinnitus sufferer reveals regions that are affected by the disease. Video still from PBS NewsHour

Today’s post was shared by Gelman on Workplace Injuries and comes from www.pbs.org

In a Washington State workers’ compensation claim, tinnitus can be recognized as a condition presenting permanent impairment at a level that correlates to a Permanent Partial Disability (PPD) award, resulting in a monetary payment at the closure of a claim. The Department of Labor and Industries policy is to pay a PPD award for tinnitus only in conjunction with a measurable level of occupationally-related hearing loss.

If you or a loved one have occupational hearing loss and associated tinnitus, a workers’ compensation claim may be filed for treatment and benefits. Feel free to contact us with any questions in this regard.

On Easter Sunday in 2008, the phantom noises in Robert De Mong’s head dropped in volume — for about 15 minutes. For the first time in months, he experienced relief, enough at least to remember what silence was like. And then they returned, fierce as ever.

It was six months earlier that the 66-year-old electrical engineer first awoke to a dissonant clamor in his head. There was a howling sound, a fingernails-on-a-chalkboard sound, “brain zaps” that hurt like a headache and a high frequency “tinkle” noise, like musicians hitting triangles in an orchestra.

Many have since disappeared, but two especially stubborn noises remain. One he describes as monkeys banging on symbols. Another resembles frying eggs and the hissing of high voltage power lines. He hears those sounds every moment of every day.

De Mong was diagnosed in 2007 with tinnitus, a condition that causes a phantom ringing, buzzing or roaring in the ears, perceived as external noise.

When the sounds first appeared, they did so as if from a void, he said. No loud noise trauma had preceded the tinnitus, as it does for some sufferers — it was suddenly just there. And the noises haunted him, robbed him of sleep and fueled a deep depression. He lost interest in his favorite hobby: tinkering with his ‘78 Trans Am and his two Corvettes. He stopped going into work.

That month, De Mong visited an ear doctor, who told him he had high frequency hearing loss in both ears. Another doctor at the Stanford Ear,…

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government

Small Increase Predicted for Social Security COLA

Today’s post comes from guest author Todd Bennett, from Rehm, Bennett & Moore.

Social Security benefits are slated to go up, but not by much. “The cost-of-living adjustment in Social Security for 2014 is likely to be very small, marking the fourth year in the last five that recipients receive little or no increase in benefits,” according to a recent CNNMoney article. 

The American Institute for Economic Research estimates the increase to be 1.4% to 1.6%.  Last year’s increase was 1.7%, and the 2012 increase of 3.6% was the only “significant rise in benefits in recent years,” according to the article.

If there are questions about your specific legal situation, please contact the firm.

DLI

Student Safety and Health Video Wins First Place

School presentations have been made throughout the state.
School presentations have been made throughout the state.

Erik Soper, from Shelton, a student at the New Market Skills Center in Tumwater, took first place in a student safety and health video contest sponsored by the Department of Labor & Industries (L&I). Soper’s 60-second video, “The Teen Worker’s Survival Guide,” used computer generated graphics to highlight the hazards, responsibilities, and rights that teen workers have in the workplace. The first-place winner received a $500 gift card.

A second-place $300 gift card was awarded to Megan Bowlen, from Olympia, also from the New Market Skills Center, for her “Twitter Safety” video.  Her entry used social media in both humorous and serious ways to bring attention to workplace safety for young workers.

The video contest is part of L&I’s Injured Young Worker Speakers Program, a young worker safety campaign that reached over 3,000 students and young workers across Washington State this spring with important messages about workplace safety.

The video contest was one element of L&I’s program to raise workplace-safety awareness among young people by using a “peer-to-peer” approach in which young workers who have been seriously injured on the job talk to students and other young workers about their life-changing experiences.  Survey results have indicated that 70 percent of the students said their awareness of workplace safety significantly increased after listening to the presentations.