Certified Master of
Workers' Compensation
- Return to Work -
Curriculum
Injury Management Core
Core Course 1: Step by Step to an Elite WC Program
The Step by Step Process to Create an Elite Workers’ Comp Program
Reducing workers’ compensation costs is an outcome, not a goal. The goal is to put a proper program into place, reducing claims and returning injured workers to work. Implementation of a workers’ compensation management program is most successful in four distinct steps completed in a specific sequence and timeframe.
This session will cover the step-by-step process for you to assess your program, identify gaps, and implement solutions that will lead to significant workers' compensation savings.
This session will cover:
- Identifying strengths and weaknesses of current injury management systems
- Creating a timetable for highest priority items
- Where to start first, and what to do next in work comp management reform
- Creating meaningful benchmarks and metrics to measure success
- Building a team and holding parties accountable throughout the project.
And more...
Core Course 2: Communication Strategies
Highly Effective Workers’ Comp Communication Strategies: What To Say & How to Say It
Communication in workers' compensation is the single most important tactic to learn and master. Every single aspect of work comp management will be better or worse depending on the effectiveness of your communication.
This training session will learn to ...
- Follow a Proven Script with Injured Workers Before and After an Injury
- Leverage Your Claims Management Team to Create Multiple Touch Points
- Prove the Value of Communication to Senior Management and Clients
- Demonstrate Care Quickly and Inexpensively
And more…
Core Course 3: Return to Work
The Definitive Guide to Return to Work Best Practices
Return-to-work is a fundamental best practice in workers' compensation management. The effectiveness of your return to work program defines the success or failure of your injury management system.
This training will cover:
- Critical elements of a transitional duty policy to build a solid return to work foundation
- Key points to reducing lost work days
- Getting employees back to work that don't like their job
- The right way to deal with doctors that won't give work restrictions
- Identifying light duty jobs that are valuable to the company, even for high wage earning employees.
- Latest research and evidence supporting pain management and recovery
And more…
Core Course 4: Injury Triage
How to Use Injury Triage to Reduce Workers' Comp Costs
The best in class standard for returning injured employees to work is 95% within 0-4 days. There are many factors that go into achieving this goal, however, leveraging medical expertise ranks high on the list of critical factors, and can be the difference between employees returning to work rapidly or potentially being out of work for an extended and often unnecessary period of time.
This session will cover:
- What is the first thing you do when an employee is injured?
- How to get your injured worker to the right level of medical treatment for every injury.
- How Injury Triage really works.
- How to set up the treating physician relationship and what medical information you need to obtain.
- When / if you talk to the injured worker, and what are you supposed to tell him?
And more…
Core Course: 5 Critical Metrics
How to Measure Workers' Comp Success with 5 Critical Metrics
5 Critical Metrics make management understand the value of workers’ compensation management. 5 Critical Metrics keep management committed over time. 5 Critical Metrics measure the success or failure of your workers’ compensation program.
We will cover the calculation and application of 5 Critical Metrics to address:
- Workers’ comp viewed as a cost of doing business
- Getting management to understand the value of return to work
- Convincing policyholders to embrace a worker recovery program
- Lack of informed and effective employer involvement in WC claims issues
- Stakeholder apathy
- Managers and supervisors not taking seriously their duty to protect workers
And more…
Core Course 6: Train Supervisors
How to Train Supervisors to Become Workers’ Comp Advocates
Supervisors are often the first to respond to an injury and are a critical component of successful workers' comp management. Those supervisors who are appropriately trained to become advocates are the catalyst to drive superior work comp claim outcomes.
This session will cover:
- Supervisor impact on claim outcome from Liberty Mutual Research Institute
- Overcoming conflicting roles of supervisors
- Specific tasks for supervisors to complete before and after injury
- How to immediately set the proper tone for the claim
- Bringing supervisors on board and rolling out training in your organization
And more…
Core Course 7: Evidence-Based Medicine
How to Use Evidence-Based Medicine to Create Better Workers’ Comp Claim Outcomes
A common fact often forgotten is workers’ compensation claims are medical injuries and medical expertise is needed to get the best claim results. The workload of the everyday adjuster is unrealistic to expect accurate and appropriate medical determinations. This session will go in-depth on how to leverage evidenced-based medicine guidelines to empower claims handlers and drive positive claim outcomes.
This session will cover:
- Integrating evidence-based medicine tools into your claims process
- Avoiding excessive medical treatment and unregulated compound prescriptions
- Getting appropriate treatment approved
- Proper utilization of doctor questions to push for needed interventions
- Proper utilization of IME questions to move the claim toward resolution
- Inappropriate use of Utilization Review
And more…
RTW Specialty Courses
Specialty Course 1: ADA Compliance
How to Coordinate Return to Work with ADA Compliance
The interpretation and application of the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) is often confusing and overwhelming. In this session you will learn from Senior Attorney Advisor of the EEOC, Aaron Konopasky, on interpretations of this law in workers’ compensation, and how to coordinate return to work best practices with ADA compliance.
Learn answers to the following and more...
- Is a reasonable accommodation having someone do part of their job? Example all lifting?
- How does the identification of light duty jobs factor into ADA's interpretation of reasonable accommodations?
- What if the employee doesn't want to return-to-work, but wants to be out of work?
- What if an employee, during the interactive process, says no, he or she is not aware of a reasonable accommodation?
- If we have a transitional duty program, are we in jeopardy of being sued by employees if we terminate them because we cannot provide a reasonable accommodation?
And more...
Specialty Course 2: Nurse Case Management
How to Use Nurse Case Management to Improve Outcomes and Lower WC Costs
Nurse case management in workers' compensation can be a highly effective service to improve outcomes and lower costs....when used correctly. When used incorrectly the nurse case manager can add additional expense with little to no added value.
In this training session you will learn:
- Clearly defined criteria for when, and when not, to use nurse case management
- How to coordinate your nurse case manager as part of your team
- Best practices you should expect from your service provider
- Red flags for when hours billed are too high
- Concrete data showing nurse case manager results
- Typical fee ranges and common billing options
And more…
Specialty Course 3: Doctor Selection
How to Select the Right Workers’ Comp Doctor
The treating physician is an extremely important person in diagnosis, treatment, and recovery for an injured worker, yet, all doctors are not created equal. In addition, finding the right workers' compensation doctor has only become more complicated with specialized medical networks, and the emergence of telemedicine.
In this training session we will cover:
- Essential characteristics of the best medical networks
- How to identify the best performing providers in network
- What to require of your PPO account executive
- When telemedicine should and should not be used
- What to do when the employer can and cannot direct care
- Red flags which indicate you immediately find a new provider
And more...