In his recent column A Workers’ Comp App Store? in Risk & Insurance, our friend Peter Rousmaniere poses the question, “When will mobile devices be used to improve work safety and injury response?” He notes that Personal Lines insurers are taking the lead and cites a few examples. He goes on to offer thoughts and ideas for a workers’ comp mobile initiatives for this “ripe communication channel.”
It’s been about a year since we took the pulse of the workers comp mobile app scene here on Workers’ Comp Insider: Last April, we posted 72 apps for your workers comp, risk management & HR toolbox, and shortly before that, a roundup of risk-related and occupational gizmos & gadgets. (As with all older posts, some links may no longer work, but most appear valid.)
In doing a Google search, we found an excellent post by Michael Allen who apparently has already done some of the heavy lifting for us: Mobile health – 40 “apps” for your workers’ comp team. He lists a variety of apps ranging from workers’ comp medical guidelines, claims-related, medication management, physical therapy, patient education, and Health, Wellness and Comorbidity management apps. (By the way, we’ll be adding his great blog to our sidebar: Tech Talk for Workers’ Comp)
Besides the listings, he offers insight into how many CIOs are building app stores from which employees can download vetted apps. He links to a piece by Clint Boulton in the WSJ about the rise of corporate app stores. Boulton says such stores, “…ensure applications used by employees, particularly those that are using their own devices, meet the company’s security standards.”
So Peter is right on the money (as usual) with his “Workers” Comp App Store” reference.
A further Google search for “OSHA apps” turned up this listing of safety apps using the keyword OSHA; Another search for ADA apps brought these results. A little digging in the “about us” section of Canvas, the site hosting these listings, says that “Canvas makes it easy to publish data collection apps on wireless Smartphones and other mobile devices such as laptops, tablets, bar code scanning devices, and Netbooks.” Among other benefits and services, it also boasts, “Canvas also offers the first mobile business application store of its kind allowing business users to find mobile applications that work on a wide variety of mobile devices, with every application being customizable by Canvas users.”
So if you want to compile a list of trustworthy insurance, business, or workers comp apps for your workforce, this might be a good tool to work with.
Meanwhile, here’s a grab bag of a few workers’ comp or risk related apps we’ve bookmarked for just such a post as this:
- OSHA Heat Safety Tool
- Acuity’s Loss Reporting App – this is a YouTube video talking about the app.
- Medscape Mobile App
- NWCDC 2012 Mobile App – last year’s Workers Comp & Disability conference had an app to manage attendee’s schedules
- DOL’s Worker Safety and Health App Challenge winners
- The Ultimate Guide To The 50+ Hottest Health And Fitness Apps, Gadgets And Startups Of The Year
- Red Cross Mobile App
- MedGadget’s Best of 2012 – features some amazing apps. The blog is a great source for emerging medical technologies.
Many of the apps we see are ghost towns – few reviews, little traction. Still, we applaud the pioneers for forging the way because in our experience, insurance as an industry is infamous for leading from behind when it comes to adaptation to new technologies.
