One of the major flaws of workers compensation acts is that deny injured workers payments for repaired hernia by establishing specific requirements for compensability.. Historically the workers’ compensation acts denied benefits since employers feared a flood of these occupational claims. In many jurisdictions special notice provisions exist and limitations have been impressed upon permanent disability benefits.
Hernias are very common and over 25% of the population suffer from this condition that involves a weakness in the abdominal wall caused by a variety of events including excessive straining, chronic constipation, obesity, physical activity and persistent coughing.
Surgeons have employed a variety of techniques in an effort to repair these defects. Since late 2005, a widely used procedure has been the insertion of Kugel mesh. This product adhered to the abdominal wall and also allowed the bowl to permit bodily products to flow through the digestive stem without obstruction. Unfortunately this products was defective and caused a rupture and/or a blockage of the intestines. The FDA initiated Class 1 recall of this product commencing on December 2005. (Dec. 22, 2005) The FDA classifies medical device recalls into three levels with the most critical and one the Agency deems that there is a “reasonable probability that the use of or continued exposure to a volatile product will cause serious adverse health consequences or death.”
Despite the inadequate remedy available in most jurisdictions, a remedy now exists for recovery for individual personal injury claimants in both state and federal court which would include negligence, intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress, violation of state deceptive practices act, breach of of implied warranty of merchantability, failure to war and unjust enrichment. Class actions have been initiated in various states and a Federal Multi-District Litigation (MDL) In re: Kugel Mesh Hernia Patch Litigation, MDL Docket No. 07-1842 ML (D.R.I.). has been established for medical monitoring and economic injury
For further information please contact our office. Jon Gelman http://www.gelmans.com/
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query obesity. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query obesity. Sort by date Show all posts
Sunday, November 4, 2007
Monday, May 30, 2022
Dual Employment Status Bars Double Recovery
An employee may have dual employers but ultimately can only receive a single recovery from only one employer for work-related injuries. The “exclusivity doctrine,” permitting a complete recovery of damages against an employer, limits an injured worker’s benefit recovery to the compensation system, barring an intentional tort.
Thursday, November 22, 2012
Report: Poor Health Costs Cost U.S. $576 Billion Yearly
The U.S. loses more GDP to poor health than Sweden's total GDP
Today's post comes from guest author Nathan Reckman from Paul McAndrew Law Firm.
The Integrated Benefits Institute (IBI), a nonprofit health and productivity research organization for businesses, recently reported that poor health costs the U.S. economy $576 billion per year. Of this amount:- $227 billion is lost due to sick days or reduced productivity due to illness,
- $232 billion is spent by employers on medical and pharmacy treatments, and
- $117 billion is spent on workers’ compensation and short- or long-term disability wage replacement.
...for every $1 employers invest in improving their employees’ health and wellness they save $3...Sean Nicholson, Ph.D., quoted in the IBI report, has stated that for every $1 employers invest in improving their employees’ health and wellness they save $3 (quite a good return on their investment!). As wisely pointed out by IBI's President, Thomas Parry, Ph.D., this report puts employers on notice that their investment in workers’ health and wellness will benefit both the workers and their employers.
This report, in addition to pointing out the dual benefits posed by increased employer investment in their employees' health and wellnes, points out one of the important choices facing our country’s healthcare system.
Source for 2011 GDP information: CIA World Factbook
Read more about Health Costs & Workers' Compensation
Feb 17, 2009
A report issued by NCCI concludes that medical costs in Workers' Compensation were higher in some instances than in Group Health Plans. The main findings were: For comparable injuries, when WC pays higher prices than ...
Nov 15, 2012
A recent study published by NCCI concludes that costs are soaring as medical conditions become more complicated by other conditions known as comorbidity diagnoses. These conditions are frequently: obesity, hypertension, drug abuse, chronic pulmonary conditions and diabetes. ... Federal Government Launches New Workplace Health Program Jun 30, 2011. Other initiatives put forth by the Obama Administration to promote prevention include the President's ...
Jan 29, 2010
Chronic conditions now result in 70% of all deaths and 75% of all health costs. Direct health care costs from cancer alone, in 2008, was $93.2 Billion of the total health care costs in the US that amounted to $304 Billion.
Apr 12, 2010
Defending occupational disease claims has always been an elusive and a costly goal for employers and insurance carriers. Employees also are confronted with obstacles in obtaining timely medical benefits. Occupational ...
Monday, April 14, 2014
Add Texting to the List of Things That Are Killing Us Faster
Today, in news that will make you feel bad about your existence: Texting and tinkering with mobile devices for extended periods of time could make you die sooner, the doctors of the world say. As The Telegraph reports, the hunchback pose that people adopt while staring down at their devices is known to increase the risk of an early death in the elderly. Chiropractors are concerned that younger people—who spend between one and two hours on their phones a day—could be shaving years off their lives. The United Chiropractic Association (and probably your mom) say that Gollum-like posture can be just as threatening a health risk as obesity, citing studies that bad posture in older people is linked with a disease called hyperkyphosis. Colloquially known as “dowager’s hump,” this condition is often associated with heart problems. Apparently older folk with even the slightest hump are 1.4 times more likely to die than those without. In other words, we’ve all been killing ourselves slowly while we sit, smoke, and apply sunscreen. Now texting is helping speed up the process. “This isn’t alarmist or scaremongering; it’s what more and more research is telling us,” UCA chiropractor Edwina Waddell told The Telegraph. “And the good news is that it doesn’t have to happen because it’s something we all have a degree of control over.” Control? Sounds like someone’s never... |
Related articles:
Nov 03, 2013
Lost in the clamor for stricter distracted-driving laws, a study from April 2013 found discouraging patterns in the relationship between texting bans and traffic fatalities. As one might expect, single occupant vehicle crashes dip ...
Oct 01, 2013
Andrew M. Cuomo revealed a plan to put "texting zones" on the New York State Thruway and state highways, where drivers can pull over and respond to text messages. This is, in part, a response to the fact that New York has ...
Oct 23, 2013
... drive on the roads. While the Federal government has strictly enforced the no texting while driving rule, the states maintain a patchwork of confusing regulations and statutory prohibitions. Today's post is shared from nj.com.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Aggravation of Prior Knee Injury Compensable in Workers Compensation
A worker who suffered an injury to a knee with a pre-existing arthritic condition was awarded workers' compensation benefits. A Wyoming court of appeals reversed a trial level decision and found that evidence existed to sufficiently establish that a fall in the workplace resulted in a material degree to have aggravated the preexisting condition.
"The claimant has a previous history of significant obesity. At 5′2″ tall with weighing close to 250 pounds, she has had extensive and excessive weight bearing on her knees. The left knee has already been replaced secondary to severe end-stage degenerative arthritis. "
The Court held, "The evidence is undisputed that despite Judd's preexisting degenerative condition, she was able to work fulltime without restriction before her work injury, and after her work injury, she suffered debilitating pain that prevented her from putting weight on her knee and from working. The work injury brought Judd's need for surgery to a head, and the Medical Commission erred in denying benefits for the surgery. The case is reversed and remanded for the award of appropriate benefits."
"The claimant has a previous history of significant obesity. At 5′2″ tall with weighing close to 250 pounds, she has had extensive and excessive weight bearing on her knees. The left knee has already been replaced secondary to severe end-stage degenerative arthritis. "
The Court held, "The evidence is undisputed that despite Judd's preexisting degenerative condition, she was able to work fulltime without restriction before her work injury, and after her work injury, she suffered debilitating pain that prevented her from putting weight on her knee and from working. The work injury brought Judd's need for surgery to a head, and the Medical Commission erred in denying benefits for the surgery. The case is reversed and remanded for the award of appropriate benefits."
Judd v. State ex. rel. Wyoming Workers' Safety and Compensation Div., ___P.3d____, 2010 WL 2541673 (Wyo. 2010) Decided June 25, 2010
Saturday, September 27, 2014
Study: People who work long hours in low-wage jobs experience higher risk of diabetes
A recent study has uncovered another possible risk factor for the development of type 2 diabetes: working long hours in low-paying jobs. In a study published this week in the Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology, researchers found that people who work more than 55 hours per week performing manual work or other low socioeconomic status jobs face a 30 percent greater risk of developing type 2 diabetes when compared to those working between 35 and 40 hours per week. The association remained even after researchers accounted for risk factors such as smoking, physical activity levels, age, sex and obesity as well as after they excluded shift work, which has already been shown to increase type 2 diabetes risk. The study is the largest so far to examine the link between long working hours and type 2 diabetes. To conduct the study, researchers examined data from 23 studies involving more than 222,000 men and women in the U.S., Europe, Japan and Australia who were followed for an average of more than seven years. While on the surface, researchers found a similar type 2 diabetes risk among those who worked more than 55 hours per week and those working a more standard 35-40 hour week, more in-depth analysis revealed that workers in low socioeconomic jobs did, indeed, face a significantly higher risk. In other words, the association between long work hours and higher type 2 diabetes risk was only apparent among low-income groups. In a related commentary published in the same journal... |
[Click here to see the rest of this post]
Saturday, September 21, 2013
Poor Diet Of Shift Workers An "Occupational Health Hazard"
 The editors of a leading journal suggest that the poor diet of shift workers should be considered an occupational health hazard. They argue that working patterns should be treated as a specific risk factor for obesity and type 2 diabetes, which have reached epidemic proportions in the developed world, with the developing world not far behind. With reference to studies published in earlier issues of the journal, that show links between increased risk in type 2 diabetes and shift work patterns in American nurses, Dr Virginia Barbour, chief editor of the journal PLoS Medicine and her fellow editors make a case in this month's edition for classing unhealthy eating as a new form of occupational hazard, especially in those workplaces that employ shift workers, whose easy access to junk food compared to healthier options just makes it harder to keep to a good diet. Shift work is common in both the developed and the developing world. About 15 to 20% of workers in Europe and the US work shifts, many of them in the health care industry. As the world moves more toward the 24/7 pattern of "open all hours", shift work will become even more common than this, and if the data from studies cited in their... |
Related articles
- Unpaid wages in Saveh Rolling and Profile Mills Company (redflag2.wordpress.com)
- Night Shift Work Causally Linked to an Increase in Breast Cancer (workers-compensation.blogspot.com)
- How Dangerous is the Night Shift? (drvitelli.typepad.com)
- The Effects of Shift Work on Sleeping Quality, Hypertension and Diabetes in Retired Workers (plosone.org)
- Working the night shift may cause cancer (mysafetysign.com)
- A Victory for Silica Dust Exposed Workers? (workers-compensation.blogspot.com)
- The Importance of Occupational Safety and Health: Making for a "Super" Workplace (workers-compensation.blogspot.com)
- American Thoracic Society Welcomes OSHA's Proposed Lower Silica Exposure Standard (workers-compensation.blogspot.com)
Thursday, August 15, 2013
ICD-10 will impact workers comp, non-HIPAA entities, too
ICD codes are ruling workers' compensation and the lives and claims of injured workers. Today's post was shared from /ehrintelligence.com.
Click here to read the entire article.
"They might not have to play by all the same rules, but healthcare providers shouldn’t forget the impact ICD-10 will have on non-HIPAA covered entities such as workers compensation, nursing homes, and home health agencies. While non-HIPAA entities are not mandated to switch to the new code set on October 1, 2014, the changing tide will sweep them along with the complex transition whether they like it or not. Medical providers should be aware of the struggles of their non-HIPAA partners, especially as the care coordination spectrum expands to include more and more external organizations that may not always be on the same page.
"t may seem like those entities that are allowed to stick with ICD-9 would be happy to do so. But in fact, staying with the old code set, which will not be maintained or updated after 2014, might be more trouble than it’s worth. Technically, workers compensation insurance could demand all provider claims to contain ICD-9 codes for as long as they please, but the undue hardship that would place on medical professionals has been deemed too great by some large insurance plans such as the Ohio Bureau of Workers Compensation (OBWC), which is planning to use ICD-10 after the implementation date.
Non-HIPAA entities could also choose to accept ICD-10 codes from providers but crosswalk them back to ICD-9 if they don’t want to upgrade their systems. But the extra work to create accurate and reliable mappings from a very detailed code to a broader ICD-9 one seems a little pointless. “Even though claims professionals don’t have to be immediately fluent in ICD-10, they should be forward-thinking and follow the market in the direction it’s headed,” suggests John Sarich, VP of Strategy for VUE Software in a post for Claims Journal. “It will require some upfront investment, but will ultimately outweigh the lost time that accompanies translating every medical record you encounter.”
"And payers such as workers compensation and property and casualty insurance (P&C) do have a vested interest in the detail and specificity provided by ICD-10, mandate or no. They will spend less time pestering physicians for more and more documentation to validate a claim for an injury, reducing the administrative burden for everyone involved – assuming payer claims processors are properly trained in the new code set and don’t need to return to the provider to ask for clarification.
Click here to read the entire article.
Monday, August 12, 2013
The 10 Top Workers Compensation Blog Posts This Month (July-Aug 2013)
The 10 Top Workers Compensation Blog Posts This Month
(July-Aug 2013)
In order of popularity
Jul 25, 2013,
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Jul 18, 2013,
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Aug 2, 2013,
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Jul 17, 2013,
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Jul 14, 2013,
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Aug 5, 2013,
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Jul 26, 2013,
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Jul 12, 2013,
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Wednesday, September 4, 2013
Avoidable Deaths from Heart Disease, Stroke, and Hypertensive Disease — United States, 2001–2010
The US CDC reports that deaths attributed to lack of preventive health care or timely and effective medical care can be considered avoidable. In this report, avoidable causes of death are either preventable, as in preventing cardiovascular events by addressing risk factors, or treatable, as in treating conditions once they have occurred. Although various definitions for avoidable deaths exist, studies have consistently demonstrated high rates in the United States. Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of U.S. deaths (approximately 800,000 per year) and many of them (e.g., heart disease, stroke, and hypertensive deaths among persons aged <75 years) are potentially avoidable.
Sunday, June 5, 2022
The Honorable Maria Del Valle-Koch Appointed the New Chief Judge and Director
The Honorable Maria Del Valle-Koch will be the New Chief Judge and Director effective Monday, June 6, 2022. Outgoing Chief Judge and Director Russell Wojenko, Jr. announced Friday that Robert Asaro-Angelo, Commissioner of NJ Labor and Workforce Development, had made the appointment.
Saturday, January 12, 2013
Medical Outcome Based Compensation - Essentially a Workers' Compensation Concept Already
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| Outcome Based Medicine Being Adopted by NYC |
In actuality the workets' compensation system rewards the employer for the most favorable outcomes by theoretically awarding lower permanent disabillity benenfits to those with the most favorable outcomes.
Adopting this concept to the nation's entire medical care system, is a wise step and one that is being advanced in the New York City Hospital system.
"In a bold experiment in performance pay, complaints from patients at New York City’s public hospitals and other measures of their care — like how long before they are discharged and how they fare afterward — will be reflected in doctors’ paychecks under a plan being negotiated by the physicians and their hospitals."
Click here to read New York Ties Doctors’ Pay to Quality of Care (NY Times)
Nov 09, 2012
On Tuesday, the American people expressed its support for a unified medical care program that will embrace all aspects of life, including industrial accidents and diseases. They validated, as did the Supreme Court, the ...
Jan 10, 2013
Soaring medical costs have afflicted the workers' compensation industry with economic distress and have severely impacted the efficient and effective delivery of medical care to injured workers. Both increased costs/profits ...
Nov 16, 2012
Adopt the new carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) medical treatment guidelines (MTG) as the standard of care for the treatment of injured workers with carpal tunnel syndrome;; Modify current MTGs to include new maintenance ...
Jan 01, 2013
Medical costs continue to be shifted to other programs including employer based medical care systems and the Federal safety net of Medicare, Medicaid, Veterans Administration and Tricare. While a trend continues to ...
Monday, April 8, 2019
Shift Work Reportedly Causally Related to Increase Risk of Diabetes and Heart Disease
Shift work has been shown to be associated with heart and metabolic disorders. A recently published study reports exactly how shift work is causally related in the long-term to both diabetes and heart disease. Workers’ Compensation claims may increase for such diseases going forward for injured workers seeking benefits for such medical conditions.
Friday, March 15, 2013
Workers' Compensation is Riding on the Road to Wellville with Obama Care
As Obama Care [The Affordable Care Act] launches, workers' compensation programs will start to undergo subtle changes The innovation of wellness programs and new treatment protocols will eventually cause major shifts to the delivery of workplace medicine.
Workers' compensation's future, ironically, has actually been viewed primarily in a rearview mirror. The shift to break with old habits has been a major struggle. The inertia will give way to a creative future based on new technologies and socio-economic challenges.
In a recent article by The Honorable David B. Torrey, Judge of Workers' Compensation ["The Affordable Care Act and Effects on the Workers' Compensation System, (7 PAWCSNL 114 at 30, March 2013)], the significance of Obama Care is reported. Judge Torrey recognizes that even those with major pecuniary interests in the compensation business have been unable to halt the momentum of change.
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
Fresno workers' compensation case highlights statewide problems
A workers' compensation company is being criticized for failing to provide medical care for a Fresno woman injured on the job more than 10 years ago.
The employee, Guadalupe Ortega, spoke out with her lawyer Tuesday morning during a press conference held by the California Applicants Attorneys Association across the street from her former employer, Lyons Magnus, a major food processor in Fresno.
Although doctors and Lyons Magnus confirmed her injuries are work related, the company's insurance carrier, Sedgwick Claims Management Services, only provided two years of temporary disability compensation — even though a qualified medical evaluator confirmed she is 70% disabled, Ortega said.
Ortega's plight highlights a larger problem for injured workers statewide who have run into more roadblocks over the past eight years to receive workers' compensation, said Ortega's lawyer, Brett Grove of Keeling Grove Law Offices in Fresno.
"Unfortunately, her experiences are not unique in the workers' compensation arena," Grove said.
Ortega's severe neck, shoulder and back injuries resulted in her losing her job, she said. Ortega became homeless, and her children were taken away from her.
"Sedgwick has turned my life into a living hell," Ortega said. "How can the state of California allow this insurance company to fail to pay legitimate claims?"
Sedgwick officials were unavailable for comment. The company is based in Memphis, Tenn., and calls itself the leading North American provider for...
[Click here to see the rest of this article]The employee, Guadalupe Ortega, spoke out with her lawyer Tuesday morning during a press conference held by the California Applicants Attorneys Association across the street from her former employer, Lyons Magnus, a major food processor in Fresno.
Although doctors and Lyons Magnus confirmed her injuries are work related, the company's insurance carrier, Sedgwick Claims Management Services, only provided two years of temporary disability compensation — even though a qualified medical evaluator confirmed she is 70% disabled, Ortega said.
Ortega's plight highlights a larger problem for injured workers statewide who have run into more roadblocks over the past eight years to receive workers' compensation, said Ortega's lawyer, Brett Grove of Keeling Grove Law Offices in Fresno.
"Unfortunately, her experiences are not unique in the workers' compensation arena," Grove said.
Ortega's severe neck, shoulder and back injuries resulted in her losing her job, she said. Ortega became homeless, and her children were taken away from her.
"Sedgwick has turned my life into a living hell," Ortega said. "How can the state of California allow this insurance company to fail to pay legitimate claims?"
Sedgwick officials were unavailable for comment. The company is based in Memphis, Tenn., and calls itself the leading North American provider for...
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