Duration is the cost. Delay is the cause. Measurement is the lever.
An average claim runs 2 months or longer, and 15% are still on wage replacement at 3 months. The variable that best predicts a long claim is not injury severity; it is how long the worker waited before treatment started.
A claim runs 2 months or longer
Average claim duration in days
Where an objective capacity number actually changes your numbers.
Frequency
Soft tissue injury is the largest lost time claim category in Canada, and it is the category most responsive to loading. Capacity work before the incident moves the frequency curve, not only the severity curve.
Duration
Duration is the cost driver and delay is what produces duration. A defined care pathway with objective retesting compresses both, with published Canadian effect sizes to show a claims committee.
66 days
Shoulder injuries healed and got back to work about 2 months sooner under a proper care pathway.
as published: MD = 66.4; 95% CI 49.1, 83.7
1.4x
Wait too long to start treatment and the worker is 1.4 times more likely to never come back at all.
as published: RRRadj = 1.4, 95% CI 1.03, 1.8
Downstream utilisation
Conservative care first reduces imaging and shortens the surgical queue for the people who genuinely need it. Nationally, 30% of low back pain patients with no red flags still received imaging.
30%
Low back pain patients without red flags who still received imaging
Canadian Institute for Health Information, in collaboration with Choosing Wisely Canada
Comorbidity
Musculoskeletal and mental health claims are not separate books. Nearly half of musculoskeletal long term disability claimants also submit claims for mental disorder medication, and mental health now drives almost 40% of new long term disability claims.
Something better than a subjective note.
Capacity data is defensible, repeatable and comparable over time. It gives a case manager a reason to approve modified duty on a date rather than negotiate one.
1.8 times greater (95% CI 1.4, 2.3)
Relative risk of returning to modified duties under the pathway
33% greater
Increase in the probability of being off wage replacement benefits
45% improvement
Improvement against a peer group of 29 hospitals, which improved 25%
$232 million (5%) per year
Annual reduction in the burden of illness attributable to physiotherapy
Deloitte LLP, prepared for Canadian Physiotherapy Association
Pilot it on one book of business.
Pick a client with a musculoskeletal problem. We will measure, benchmark and retest, and you will have a duration trend line to look at.
