As we look towards 2013 from the last quarter of 2012, there is one thing that is certain and that is that 2013 will be a year of great change in Workers' Compensation. Whether that change will be positive or negative is still uncertain.
As the current business culture evolves into one riddled with legal battles and threats of lawsuits coming from discharged employees, many managers feel cornered when addressing employee performance evaluations. Even those who follow stringent documentation guidelines often feel pressured into keeping unproductive employees in their positions or giving ambiguous performance feedback, due to their fear of legal action.
Sometime over the last few years, the baby boomers started to retire. This has created a complex double-edged sword for professionals. While these people are typically in need of legal and financial help, they are also more likely to suffer from some type of dementia. This problem is compounded by the fact that people typically wait until later in their life to perform complex transactions.
The overwhelming passage of Senate Bill 863 (De La Torre) in the waning moments of the end of the California legislative session set the workers' compensation community abuzz.
Employers and their claims administrators must aggressively assert and maintain their medical control over any new claim reported under their Medical Provider Network.
Data can offer a clear picture of actual provider performance. Evaluating physician and other provider performance is a matter of scrutinizing the data using industry research to learn what to look for. In fact, leveraging published industry research is the way to skip the laborious and expensive regression analyses and other predictive modeling methods.
On July 26, 2012, a federal judge in Las Vegas ordered Prospect Airport Services, Inc., a provider of wheelchair assistance services to airline passengers, to implement extensive measures to prevent future sexual harassment.