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Friday, December 2, 2011

Penalties for Insurance Companies Who Fail to Pay Enough for Medical Care

The quality of medical care for workers' compensation beneficiaries has always been a major issue. Injured workers just don't want to go to an employer selected physician.They want to go to a doctor who provides good quality medical care and one they have confidence in. It makes good medical sense. While one concept to adjust the issue is to compel insurance carriers to pay for outcome driven results. If the doctor cures you, then the doctor should be paid in full for the reasonable value of his or her services. If the opposite, well then maybe the doctor should get paid less.

Another approach, enacted by the federal government is to compel insurance carriers to pay a certain percentage of premiums collected for medical care, instead of paying large sums for administration expenses. That could be applied to workers' compensation carriers. Instead of paying 80% of the premium to fight the claim, workers' compensation insurance companies should be compelled to pay 80% to cure the medical condition.

Read more about this concept:
HHS Unveils Medical Loss Ratio Rule (Kaiser Health Breaking News)
"The Department of Health and Human Services today released its final medical loss ratio rule. According to an HHS press release, the rule will ensure that health insurance companies spend at least 80 percent of consumers' health insurance premiums on medical care rather than on income, overhead and marketing expenses. "If your insurance company doesn't spend enough of your premium dollars on medical care or quality improvement this year, they'll have to give you rebates next year," said CMS Acting Administrator Marilyn Tavenner, in the release . "This will bring costs down and give insurance companies the incentive to focus on what matters for patients – high quality health care."
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For over 3 decades the Law Offices of Jon L. Gelman  1.973.696.7900  jon@gelmans.com have been representing injured workers and their families who have suffered occupational accidents and illnesses.

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