A common mistake that occurs when companies switch Workers' Compensation Insurers is that they forget to update their provider panel. A workers' compensation provider panel is a group of healthcare providers authorized to provide medical treatment to injured workers as part of a workers' compensation insurance program.
When an employee gets injured on the job, they may be eligible to receive workers' compensation benefits to cover medical expenses and lost wages. To receive these benefits, the injured worker typically needs to receive medical treatment from a provider who is authorized by their employer's workers' compensation insurance carrier.
The specific providers included on a workers' compensation provider panel can vary depending on the insurance company. Most insurance companies allow you to choose a panel or providers but often default to a generic list of providers. The provider panel ensures that injured workers receive high-quality medical care covered by their workers' compensation insurance.
With a carefully chosen panel, you can speed up the time to recovery for your employee while reducing the immediate and long-term cost to your company. In the short term, a well-chosen panel can reduce the costs involved in managing a workplace injury. In the long term, you can keep your workers’ compensation insurance costs down by limiting the duration of time injured employees are out of work and by controlling the cost of treating an injury.
How to Choose a Workers' Compensation Injury Provider Panel
- Your provider panel should include experts in occupational health, orthopedics, physical therapy, vision care and other specialties. While many providers claim to offer occupational health as one of their services, only The Occupational Health Center (OHC) specializes in occupational medicine.
- Each member of your Workers' Compensation Provider Panel should understand the nuances of PA Workers' Compensation laws to keep paperwork flowing, to keep billing accurate, and to carefully balance the needs of your company and the injured employee.
- To avoid making patients wait for tests and specialist consultations, it's critical that your provider is a part of a network of providers.
- Your panel providers need to be reliable partners. If you can’t get the same person on the phone when you call a provider, how are you going to be able to work through a case? Consider a provider that will invest in a business relationship with your company. The OHC has the most experienced team in Chester County.
- Your providers must be responsive! When there is an accident, everyone wants to do the right thing to help their employee. They might not know what that is and when in doubt, they send patients to the emergency room. Sometimes the emergency room is the right call, but last year, 66% of the workplace accidents seen in The Chester County Hospital Emergency Department could have been treated more quickly and more affordably at the Occupational Health Center. When there is an accident, our clients can call us, and we will help triage the injury over the phone and let you know whether to come to us or to head right to the emergency department.
Check your panel. Make sure you have providers you know and trust. If you need help choosing or updating a panel, please contact us.