Travelers recently released the results of a 4 year review of 1.5 million workers compensation claims. The information below and links should help your company understand common work comp injuries and give you an idea if your business is vulnerable to these types of claims. If you are, we highly recommend your Colorado or Denver based business create a workers compensation safety plan to help avoid accidents and injuries. From the article:
The top five injuries as a percentage of total claims are:
- strains and sprains (30 percent)
- cuts or punctures (19 percent)
- contusions (12 percent)
- inflammation (5 percent)
- fractures (5 percent)
By business size and industry, strains and sprains topped all lists for the most common type of injury except for small businesses, which experienced cuts or punctures most frequently, followed by strains and sprains. Eye injuries were among the most common injuries in both construction and manufacturing.
The injuries with the highest average incurred costs included amputations, dislocations, electric shock, crushing and multiple trauma injuries, such as breaking multiple bones at once. These severe injuries have typically occurred less frequently overall.
The most frequent causes of workplace injuries include:
- Material handling (32 percent of total claims)
- Slips, trips and falls (16 percent)
- Being struck by or colliding with an object (10 percent)
- Accidents involving tools (7 percent)
- Traumas occurring over time, for example when a part of the body is injured by overuse or strain (4 percent).
The above incidents most often resulted in strains, sprains, cuts, punctures, contusions, inflammation, fractures or chronic sicknesses resulting from a type of work (e.g., a skin disease caused by chemical exposure). On average, strains and sprains resulted in 57 missed work days, followed by cuts and punctures at 24 days. Of the most commonly-resulting injuries, inflammation and fractures caused the most time away from work at 91 and 78 days, respectively.
Fore more information please visit the insurance journal article or the Travelers Injury Impact Report.
Orcutt Insurance Group is a local independent insurance agency serving this amazing state since 2004. Please contact us to discuss workers compensation and your business.
Thank you for your time.
The Orcutt Group Team