It’s Health Wonk Review week and Brad Wright has a fresh, newsy, engaging issue posted over at Wright on Health, the Health Wonk Review: Who’s On First? Edition.
He grapples with health reform, alternative facts, and many other topics. To stay in the know in this dynamic climate, HWR is a great way to stay current on the changing landscape.
Here are a few other news items we’ve noted this week:
- Another Circle Of Hell: Surviving Opioids In The Fentanyl Era: “There’s a clear culprit in the rising drug overdose death count in Massachusetts — the synthetic opioid fentanyl. More powerful and more deadly than heroin, fentanyl has sparked a new set of survival rules among people who abuse opioids.”
- Joe Paduda tells us that 4 million jobs may disappear when autonomous driving is fully implemented. Welcome to the Robot Revolution.
- At Work Comp Wire, Eric Patton offers his thoughts on Strategies to Manage the Pandora’s Box of Comorbid Conditions: Perhaps the fear associated with covering claimants with comorbidities has prevented adjusters from understanding the scope of these conditions, how they impact their WC programs, and how they can use such insights to enhance the clinical management of their claims. Being aware of conditions—beyond the work-related injury—allows us to have a holistic view of the patient’s health and to provide a more comprehensive care approach that can truly impact outcomes.
- Two new healthcare insurance reform ideas we thought worth citing – both articles by Sarah Kliff at Vox: The newest GOP health idea? Auto-enroll the uninsured and How Alaska fixed Obamacare.
In the “in case you missed it” department:
- Trump signs resolution to strike down ‘Volks’ recordkeeping rule: President Donald Trump has signed a Congressional Review Act resolution to repeal OSHA’s so-called “Volks” rule, which addressed employers’ ongoing obligation to make and maintain accurate records of work-related injury and illness data.
- Kudos ot Eric Eyre of The Charleston Gazette, who won a Pulitzer for his excellent two-part December series: Drug firms poured 780M painkillers into WV amid rise of overdoses and part two, ‘Suspicious’ drug order rules never enforced by state
- Inside Alabama’s Auto Jobs Boom: Cheap Wages, Little Training, Crushed Limbs – at BloombergBusinessWeek, Peter Waldman offer a gritty look at how the South’s manufacturing renaissance comes with a heavy price.
Quick takes
- Safety: Bosses banned from forcing women to wear high heels in Canadian province
- The pharmacist who was afraid of needles and the ADA
- A rogue’s gallery of insurance fraudsters, 2016 style
- Bob Wilson: At United, It Wasn’t the Beating. It was the Self-Inflicted Wounds.
- 2017 Most Dangerous Emerging Risks
- NY Workers’ Comp Reforms Draw Praise and Criticism
- Florida Workers’ Comp Reform Battle Far From Over
- Claim Adjusters’ Best Tips to Avoid Workers’ Comp Missteps
- Horseplay results in claim denial for NJ firefighter
- Roberto Ceniceros: Telemedicine’s Urgent Questions
- Report: Telehealth’s economic impact could have broad reach in rural communities
- Ergonomics and Mobile Workers
- Landscaping Safety and Health
- Video: Every Minute Counts: Emergency Response Planning in Forestry
- Just for fun: Whack-a-Bone, the anatomy game
