Sentry Insurance announced Monday the development of a predictive modeling tool designed to help identify early risk factors in injured worker cases.
The Injured Employee Complexity Factor Models will look at early factors in workplace injury claims, such as chronic pain and psychosocial risks, which are believed to prolong and prevent successful injured worker recovery.
The Stevens Point, Wisconsin-based insurer says that average comp claims involving early risk factors can remain open longer and cost employers more.
Risk factors can include anxiety, stress, lack of familial support, financial concerns, fear of re-injury and difficulty adjusting to physical and emotional changes.
Greg Larson, assistant vice president of workers compensation claims, said the goal is to identify certain physical or psychological markers early in the life of a claim and provide tools and support to injured workers that will help them “deal with their pain, their injury, their recovery. All of those anxiety points that most people go through if they’re in that situation.”
“As an industry, we’re great about providing and supporting an injured worker from a physical perspective,” he said. “Ultimately, we’ve missed the opportunity to really help the psyche or the psychosocial piece of a recovery.”
The tool enables Sentry to create managed care plans for injured workers that address both physical and mental barriers that may delay recovery.