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1. Report claims ASAP
The sooner your Zenith Claims Examiner
knows about the claim, the sooner they can
begin to work with you, the employee, and the
physician to get the right medical treatment,
appropriate benefits, and begin the return to
work process. And it is NEVER too early to get
the employee and the physician thinking about
return to work.
2. Stay in contact with employee
The longer the injured worker is out, the
less likely they are to return to their
original job. And the longer they are out of
contact with work, the more likely they are to
stay out. Regular contact has been shown to
significantly reduce the length of time an
employee is off work and makes the transition
back to work much easier. That results in
reduced costs to you.
3. Think "tasks" not
"job"
You may not have a "job" for the
injured worker, but he or she can probably do
many of the tasks of his or her job in spite
of the injury. And there are probably other
tasks around the workplace that are going
undone because they may not be part of
anyone's job. With help from your Zenith
Claims and/or Safety & Health
professional, there are probably several
temporary solutions available to you that
aren't "jobs", but that will bring
value to your company and speed the employee's
recovery.
4. Stay within restrictions
Sometimes a zealous supervisor will push
for more than is appropriate for a returning
worker. Sometimes the worker will push beyond
what he or she is supposed to do. Either way,
there is a potential for re-injury and
prolonged lost time. Make sure your
supervisors actively enforce the work
restrictions given by the physician. And use
common sense: if the return is to one handed
work, make sure there is no possibility that
the one hand being used isn't being over used.
5. Incentivize transitional work
People do what you compensate them to do.
You compensate your supervisors to manage
their people to produce the most product to
the highest standard in the shortest time with
the fewest people. It's no wonder some of them
are resistant to bringing injured workers back
before full medical release. Some employers
pay a bonus for supervisors who are creative
in bringing employees back to work. You don't
have to go that far though. Just make sure
that the supervisor's annual review includes a
RTW component. Or another idea might be to
charge worker's salaries to the original
department, but let them work in another
department that is open to transitional work.
The first supervisor will get the message
quickly that he's paying for someone else's
production.
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