There is a change coming to medical coding, and like it or not, it is going to have a major impact on the workers’ compensation industry. In 1979 the United States adopted the International Classification of Diseases version 9, commonly referred to today as ICD-9. It is a listing of 14,000 medical codes that are…
Roasting a Sheriff, Celebrating Sound, and a Plea for Help
As I have written previously, I am an active member of the Sertoma Club of Greater Sarasota, and February and March are a very busy time for me. If you will indulge me for a moment, I’d like to talk about two very important events that I am involved with regarding that club. Sertoma, which…
Death Awaits the Poor Who Sit Alone
Some more happy studies landed on my cluttered desk this morning, but the good news is, despite their negative findings, we can learn from them not just to survive, but to live to screw up another day. The findings, in a nutshell, are this: Being poor increases your chance of dying early by 19%. Being…
Workers' Comp Suit over Helicopter Crash Loses Altitude in Federal Court
Eric Henrikson was an 8 year veteran with the Sacramento County, California Sheriff's Department, when he was severely injured in a helicopter crash. The 2005 crash also killed two other deputies. The injuries Henrikson sustained ended his career, and the county paid out almost $2 million in workers' compensation up until last year. After Henrikson…
Does Claims Stress Increase Disability?
An interesting study caught my eye last week. It seems researchers from Stanford University studying claim history in Australia found that the stress of filing an injury claim may actually increase the severity of disability over the long term. If their results are correct, it should give those of us in the workers’ compensation industry…
Cleaning Balls has a Bearing on Injury
An explosion that rocked a New Hampshire factory this week, sending 15 workers to the hospital, apparently occurred while the workers were cleaning their balls in an acid room. The accident, which blew out most of the first floor windows and closed the factory for two days, was apparently the result of the use of…
Giving Workers' Comp to Students Can be Explosive Issue
The Graduate Professional Student Assembly at Cornell University passed a resolution Monday calling upon the University to provide workers' compensation to graduate students who are injured while working on the campus. Since many grad students receive stipends for research or teaching, the students believe they should be considered employees, rather than students. One of the…
Mile High Club – There is a (Stupid) App for That
It was inevitable, I suppose. First, we saw the development of the mobile app “Bang a Friend”, a program that allowed for the rapid deployment of sexually transmitted diseases amongst mutual acquaintances. It worked by allowing a person to anonymously “tag” a person they presumably would like to “bang”. If that person tagged them back…
Fired Up by Flatulence
It could have been so much worse. 90 workers were toiling in the facility when it happened. The poorly ventilated building experienced a build up of explosive gas, which combusted unexpectedly. No one is sure why, but they believe one of the workers touched off a static discharge, causing the conflagration. The building was damaged,…
The Looming $20 Billion MSA Train Wreck: Welcome Aboard
There is a $20 Billion calamity on the tracks ahead, and no one seems to care. As this train hurtles ever closer to its inevitable demise, the passengers ride oblivious, unaware that the torturous path that led them there; a path that was supposed to protect them, has a serious flaw in its design. A…