EPA Expands List of Safer Chemical Ingredients

Today's post was shared by US EPA News and comes from yosemite.epa.gov

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) today added more than 130 chemicals to its Safer Chemical Ingredients List. For the first time, 119 fragrance chemicals for commercial and consumer cleaning products have been added to the list.

“Fragrances are an important yet complex part of many consumer cleaning products. By adding fragrance and other chemicals to the Safer Chemical Ingredients List, EPA continues its commitment to help companies make safer products and provide the public with greater access to chemical information,” said James Jones, acting assistant administrator for the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention.

The Safer Chemical Ingredients List, which now contains 602 chemicals, serves as a resource for manufacturers interested in making safer products; health and environmental advocates seeking to encourage the use of safer chemicals; and consumers seeking information on the ingredients in safer chemical products.

It also serves as a guide for Design for the Environment (DfE) labeled products, which must meet EPA’s rigorous, scientific standards for protecting human health and the environment.

More than 2,500 products are certified under the DfE Standard for Safer Products including all-purpose cleaners, laundry and...

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Read more about "fragrances" and workers' compensation.

Workers' Compensation: Sign of the Times: Fragrance Free Workplace

Jul 09, 2012

When visiting City Hall, please help us by not wearing perfume, cologne, or other fragrances. If you are wearing a fragrance, you will need to remain at the front of the building when visiting. Thank you for your help! Tuttle.

http://workers-compensation.blogspot.com/

Workers' Compensation: The Hazards of Alcohol-Based Hand ...

Mar 19, 2013

Additionally the fragrances used may be toxic. Virginia Evans and Peter Orris from the University of Illinois authored a ... Labels: fragrances, Hand sanitizers, toxic chemicals. Posted by Jon Gelman at Tuesday, March 19, 2013.

http://workers-compensation.blogspot.com/

Workers' Compensation: Is the Cosmetic Industry the Next Tobacco ...

Jul 21, 2010

The generic and plan properties of the sun screens have been polluted by the carcinogenic properties of fragrances that have been reported to cause cancer themselves. The Safe Cosmetics Act, now under consideration by ...

http://workers-compensation.blogspot.com/

Workers' Compensation: US EPA Reaches Agreement With 70 ...

Jun 21, 2012

Givaudan Fragrances Corporation (Fragrances North America) 29. Goodrich Corporation on behalf of itself and Kalama Specialty Chemicals, Inc. 30. Hess Corporation, on its own behalf and on behalf of Atlantic Richfield ...

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Three more states report Cyclospora cases; total rises to 283

Today's post was shared by CIDRAP and comes from www.cidrap.umn.edu

Three more states are reporting Cyclospora infections, pushing the national total to 283, but it's not clear which of the newly reported cases are part of the national outbreak, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and individual states reported today.
In its update today, the CDC added Georgia, Connecticut, and New Jersey to its map of cyclosporiasis cases, which means nine states are now reporting cases. Georgia has two cases, and Connecticut and New Jersey each have one.

About half of the total cases are from Iowa, which reported its first cases in early July. In an update today the Iowa Department of Public Health (IDPH) said 134 cases have been reported in the state so far, which is seven more than reflected in the CDC total.

The Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services (NDHHS) also updated its case count today, adding one more case that isn't reflected in the CDC's total to bring its total to 69. The combined new cases in Iowa and Nebraska raise the total number of US cases to 283.

Texas is third in case numbers, with 65.

The CDC said totals in those three states may include some travel-associated cases and that interviews are pending. It also noted that the single cases reported from Illinois and Kansas probably involved infections acquired in neighboring outbreak states.
Wisconsin has confirmed four Cyclospora cases.

William Gerrish, director of communications for the Connecticut Department of Public Health, said both of the state's patients are...

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Shifting the Blame: Doctors Look To Others To Play Biggest Role In Curbing Health Costs

Blame for increased medical costs is getting tossed around like a political football. Those deeply entrenched into the system are pointing their finger at "the other" party to shift responsibility. This reminds one of when CMS in 1980 urged the passage of the Medical Secondary Payer Act. 

As this process continues, ultimately the US Government will be the final authority as Medicare ultimately rules the medical billing field and outcome based medicine seems to be the new goal.

Workers' Compensation system will ultimate adapt or be subsumed by the Medicare protocols in one fashion or another.  Special interests  will have little opportunity to cut out their specialized markets.

Today's post was shared by Kaiser Health News and comes from capsules.kaiserhealthnews.org

In a study, published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Mayo Clinic researchers surveyed more than 2,500 doctors to assess their views of different approaches to rein in the nation’s health care costs. The doctors were randomly selected from an American Medical Association database.

When it comes to controlling the country’s health care costs, doctors point their fingers at lawyers, insurance companies, drug makers and hospitals. But well over half acknowledge they have at least some responsibility as stewards of health care resources.

Based on their findings, 59 percent of doctors believed they have some responsibility in holding down  health care costs. Only 36 percent thought they have a major role.

Why are there revisions to the jobs numbers?

Workers' Compensation premiums are usually estimated based on anticipated payroll numbers. As those change so does the cost of workers' compensation premiun costs. Basically they are both subject to retroactive audits to verify accuracy. Today's post was shared by BLS-Labor Statistics and comes from www.bls.gov

Why are there revisions to the jobs numbers?

By Thomas Nardone, Kenneth Robertson, and Julie Hatch Maxfield

At the beginning of each month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reports the change in payroll employment for the previous month. This estimate of jobs gained or lost over the month is closely watched by policymakers and those who work in financial markets and the media.

When the estimate is revised in subsequent months, however, data users sometimes perceive a very different picture of the job market than what was initially reported. Data users frequently ask why the number was revised. The short answer is, the revised estimate includes additional information that was not available at the time of the initial release information that makes the revised estimate more accurate.

This Beyond the Numbers article explains the data collection process that BLS conducts every month to produce the estimate of U.S. employment change. The article will also clarify why BLS releases revisions to the initial release, so that users will better understand the change, if any, in the data.

Hospitals May Soon Be Reaching For The Stars

Should injured workers have the opportunity to select the "best rated" medical provider? The Federal government is looking forward to providing outcome base rating information. The workers' compensation system should utilize that information and allow injured workers to be able make an educated choice in seeking medical care. Today's post was shared by Kaiser Health News and comes from www.kaiserhealthnews.org

Star wars may be coming to a hospital near you.

Medicare is considering assigning stars or some other easily understood symbol to hospitals so patients can more easily compare the quality of care at various institutions. The ratings would appear on Medicare’s Hospital Compare website and be based on many of the 100 quality measures the agency already publishes.

The proposal comes as Medicare confronts a paradox: Although the number of ways to measure hospital performance is increasing, those factors are becoming harder for patients to digest. Hospital Compare publishes a wide variety of details about medical centers, including death rates, patient views about how well doctors communicated, infection rates for colon surgery and hysterectomies, emergency room efficiency and overuse of CT scans.

In its proposed rules for hospitals in the fiscal year starting Oct. 1, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services asked for ideas about "how we may better display this information on the Hospital Compare Web site. One option we have considered is aggregating measures in a graphical display, such as star ratings."

Private groups such as Consumer Reports, the Leapfrog Group and US News and World Report already issue hospital guides that boil down the disparate Medicare scores -- along with their own proprietary formulas -- to come up with numeric scores, letter grades or rankings.

But even before it's formally proposed, the possibility of the government rating...

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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.

Read more about "medical treatment" and workers' compensation:

Workers' Compensation: What Medical Expenses Are Covered In A ...

Apr 15, 2013

The main difference is in Nebraska, as long as the worker elects a prior treating doctor to treat their injury (for example, the worker's family doctor), that doctor can dictate the medical care and refer them to others for treatment.

http://workers-compensation.blogspot.com/

NJ Bayonne Medical Center - Highest Priced Medicine in the Nation

May 18, 2013

While workers' compensation insurance carriers may set approved fees or contract with providers, hospitals have huge disparities in the cost for medical care provided. Additionally, there appears to be no difference in the ...

http://workers-compensation.blogspot.com/

NY Worker's Compensation Board Proposes New Medical - Workers ...

Nov 16, 2012

New York Worker's Compensation Board's proposed new medical treatment guidelines that will modify 2010 previously implemented. Adopt the new carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) medical treatment guidelines (MTG) as the ...

http://workers-compensation.blogspot.com/

Obama Administration Delays and Simplifies Rules on Health Care

Jul 03, 2013

Read more about The Affordable Health Care Act: Workers' Compensation: Protecting Healthcare Workers. May 06, 2013. Kerri A. Thom, MD, MS, Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of Maryland School of ...

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WHEN IS THE RIGHT TIME TO APPLY FOR SOCIAL SECURITY DISABILITY?

Today's post comes from guest author Susan C. Andrews from Causey Law Firm.

     We get many calls from folks who have been off work for a while, and are wondering if the time is right to place an application for Social Security Disability benefits. There are several program rules that should be kept in mind in making this decision.

Applications for Social Security Disability
now can be filed online.

      The first thing to know about Social Security Disability is that it is a program for people who have one or more health issues that prevent the person from working for a period of at least 12 continuous months. If you have not yet been off work for that length of time, but anticipate that may be the case, you may want to go ahead and apply, since the entire process can take months and, in some cases, a year or more, before a final decision is made. On the other hand, if you are fairly confident you will be able to get back to work before 12 months has passed, then holding off makes more sense.

  ...benefits can go back no more than one year from the date of the application. This is a matter of concern for those who hold off too long and, as a result, lose out on benefits to which they are entitled.

      To collect any benefits at all, one must satisfy the above-described 12-month duration requirement. That said, once a person has satisfied the 12-month rule, it also is helpful to know that benefits cannot begin until five full months after the date of the onset of disability. So, for example, if I am diagnosed with a cancer and, because of my treatment, I must stop working on June 7, 2013, (and I know, because of the course of proposed treatment, that I am likely to be off work for more than 12 continuous months), then I could apply right away, but benefits would not begin until December of 2013. The five full months that I must wait for benefits to begin (in this example, July through November) is called the waiting period. The month of June cannot be counted because it is not a full month.  Thus, if there is some possibility I might be able to return to work before 12 months has passed, depending on how my treatment goes, then I might want to hold off initially, to see how it goes.

Transportation Accidents: Data Recorders Will Soon Define Compensability of Accidents

Workers' compensation claims are often defined by whether the accident arose out of and in the course of the employment. New technology in the coming years maybe become critical evidence in determining the casual relationship of transportation accidents as well as whether the employee deviated from the employment at the time of the event.

Event Data Recorder

"....at the center of a growing debate over a little-known but increasingly important piece of equipment buried deep inside a car: the event data recorder, more commonly known as the black box.

"About 96 percent of all new vehicles sold in the United States have the boxes, and in September 2014, if the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has its way, all will have them.

"The boxes have long been used by car companies to assess the performance of their vehicles. But data stored in the devices is increasingly being used to identify safety problems in cars and as evidence in traffic accidents and criminal cases. And the trove of data inside the boxes has raised privacy concerns, including questions about who owns the information, and what it can be used for, even as critics have raised questions about its reliability.

Click here to read the entire article, "A Black Box for Car Crashes" NY Times