With the rising costs of healthcare and increasing obligations of insurance carriers in the administration of workman’s comp claims, reducing costs and administrative burdens are increasingly becoming a top priority. Mobile health technology is an emerging field that has the potential to provide cost savings and reduced claim administration time to insurance carriers and their estimators for workman’s comp claims involving catastrophic injuries.
One of the most common workman’s comp injuries involves injury to the claimant caused by a slip or fall at work, according to Trusted Choice. When the injury is catastrophic in nature and the claimant sustains several broken bones or requires major surgery, it is often difficult if not medically prohibited for the claimant to travel alone to and from medical or other appointments related to the claim. It is in these types of cases that mobile technology can save insurance carriers money while reducing administrative burdens for the estimator assigned to the claim. For instance, telemedicine services offered by the workman’s comp healthcare provider would eliminate the need for that claimant to obtain assistance in getting to claim-related appointments. The claimant is much more likely to comply with the medical provider’s treatment recommendations which reduces the need for estimators to continually follow up with the claimant on treatment compliance. In turn, the claimant’s chances of requiring additional costly treatment or additional hospital stays are greatly reduced which also reduces claim costs for the insurance carrier.
Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conducted a study with 200 participants regarding costs associated with mobile technology in the healthcare field, or mHealth. The study revealed that the use of mHealth technologies assists in reducing cost while increasing quality of patient care received. Approximately 90% of the participants were already using mobile technology in their healthcare organization, which includes technology such as mobile apps for patients, telemedicine services and communication between patient and healthcare provider via text message. Just over 50% of the participants cited cost concern as a significant obstacle with regard to utilization of additional mobile healthcare technology for their organization; however, 54% of those surveyed stated a realization of reduced costs when mobile technology had been implemented within the organization.
The cost of implementing mobile healthcare technology within workman’s comp claims is but one of many challenges facing insurance carriers. When an insurance carrier partners with a Direct Medical Equipment Benefits Manager (DBM) such as Northwood, cost savings and reduced administration time on workman’s comp claims becomes a reality. Northwood has years of experience in the durable medical equipment, prosthetics and orthotics (DMEPOS) field and has built up an extensive network of contracted DMEPOS and pharmacy services providers. This network is accessible to workman’s comp estimators working for Northwood’s insurance carrier partners, and will save considerable time for the estimators on workman’s comp claims by allowing them to utilize its network of contracted providers. Please contact Northwood if your organization is interested in discussing this partnership.
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