Adjusters, Risk Managers, and Safety – WCRI Shocking Back Injury Numbers
I recently read through a WCRI (Workers Comp Research Institute) article that should cause adjusters, risk managers, and safety professionals great concern about back injuries. Let us look at the study generally.
If you or your company are members, the study remains a freebie. You can find the link to the study at the bottom of this article. Even if you are not a member, the study can be accessed for a nominal fee here.
The study examines back and shoulder claims that exceeded $65,000 within the first three years. To see a quick video on the subject, check it out below. The shocker for adjusters, risk managers, and safety professionals comes from the source of the back claims. I thought the source would be lifting heavy objects or repetitive lifting. That was totally wrong. (ugh!). See below the video for more information.
What is the Big Concern?
See the chart below. This comes directly from the study, and the injury sources show that this is paid, not reserves or Total Incurred.
In other words, the chart reflects medical cash paid. In other words, adjusters, risk managers, and safety professionals, you do not want these claims to show up on a loss run. No matter how you finance your workers comp risk with self-insurance, large deductible, regular policy, captive, or otherwise, these are shocker numbers.
As I mentioned earlier, sprains and strains are not the highest sources of injuries. Who knew? Yes, I did not show the X-axis labels. I promised Andy at WCRI not to give the farm away with any of my articles on their studies.
No, this is not an advertisement for the study. WCRI did provide me a copy of the study to review, as I usually dig in a little further than the press releases. What do you notice about the J&L website – no ads present.
