Quote of the day
"Workers can still make a request to change physicians at any time. And very few do. In our history, less than four-tenths of a percent of our injured workers request a change."
Elizabeth Starkey, communications manager for Pinnacol Assurance, one of Colorado's largest workers' compensation insurance providers
Arrests Won’t Hold Up Development, Says Riverside Co. Official
Prosecutors charge four people connected to Twentynine Palms’ Turtle Rock housing project with underreporting wages to their workers’ compensation insurers, in potentially the largest case of workers’ comp fraud in Riverside County history. But Deputy District Attorney Paul Fick says the arrests will not affect development. By Kurt Schauppner, Desert Trail (Twentynine Palms)
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Colorado Lawmakers Debate Choice-of-Physician Bill
The Colorado House of Representatives debates a bill that would require employers to give injured workers a choice between two doctors, and allow them to request a change any time within the first 90 days of treatment. Injured workers have complained for years that state’s 16-year-old workers’ compensation system gives them little control over who treats their injuries. By Jeri Clausing, Denver Post [With Photo] Go to the Full Story…
Cancer-Stricken Warehouse Worker Wins Radiation Exposure Case
A 45-year-old former warehouseman successfully argues to the New York Workers’ Compensation Board that he contracted a rare form of cancer from relatively recent radiation exposure at a former nuclear fuel-products site. The Hicksville, N.Y., site is the target of a federal radiological and toxic waste investigation and cleanup. By Mark Harrington, Newsday
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Study: Carpal Tunnel Can Slash Future Earnings
A study of nearly 8,800 workers’ compensation claims made in Washington State between 1993 and 1994 finds that carpal tunnel syndrome can keep individuals off work for months and, in future years, dramatically slash what they earn. By Amy Norton, Reuters
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Litigation in Death of Illegal Alien May Go Beyond Workers’ Comp
The attorney for an illegal Mexican worker killed in a house collapse at a Georgia home construction site says the circumstances of the case may give rise to litigation beyond workers’ compensation. “I can’t understand how an 80-percent-complete house blows over in a 33 mile-per-hour wind,” says Atlanta lawyer L. Brown Bivens. MainStreetNews.com (Jefferson, Ga.)
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West Virginia Workers Say They’re Getting the Runaround
“I have worn my finger out using the telephone,” says injured West Virginia trucking company worker Allen Stouts, about his frustrating experiences trying to get prescriptions and procedures covered. The state’s exclusive private workers’ compensation insurer BrickStreet Mutual has subcontracted out pre-2005 claims. By Gabe Gutierrez, WBOY-TV (Clarksburg – Fairmont, W.V.)
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Commentary: High Court’s Ruling a Blow to Australian States
The Australia High Court’s recent ruling that telecommunications group Optus can opt out state-based occupational health and safety schemes and self-insure in the less expensive federal Comcare scheme is another blow to states’ rights. Some say workplaces will not be adequately scrutinized. By Eleanor Hall and Samantha Donovan, World Today (Australia)
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