The Workers’ Compensation Research Institute (WCRI) published a new set of reports that explore medical payment trends in 18 state workers’ comp systems, analyzing the impact of legislative and regulatory changes on these costs.
A total of 14 reports are available, with data from 18 states representing 60% of the nation’s workers’ comp benefit payments. With each individual report averaging 50 pages, there is a wide range of information available. The following are key highlights:
- California’s prescription payments per claim stabilized after 2018 following very rapid decreases and remains the lowest of the study states
- Florida experienced a 5% decrease in medical payments in 2020-2021, reflecting the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, while prices paid for professional services were lowest of the study states
- Illinois had among the highest utilization of medical services of the study states, largely driven by physical medicine
- Louisiana costs per claim were among the highest of the states for all components (medical, indemnity and benefit delivery expenses) for 2018 and 2020 claims
- Texas experienced a decrease of 6% in payment for physical medicine services from 2014-2015 and 2017-2018. However, payments changed very little from 2017-2020
Tags: claim data, medical spend, WCRI
