Category: Research

Mar
23

When people use cannabis do they stop using other drugs?

Posted by Joe Paduda on Friday, March 23rd, 2018 | Comments

There’s been some good research into this – which may be THE key question when it comes to medical marijuana.

The answer appears to be – some do stop using other drugs. And, even better, fewer people die.

Key findings using Medicare data:

  • States with medical marijuana laws saw about 10% fewer daily doses of opioids than those without those laws.
  • States with dispensaries only (no home cultivation) saw a 14% decrease in opioid doses
  • Total savings to Medicare and Medicaid would be about $3.4 billion if all states adopted Medical Marijuana Laws – but the folks buying the marijuana would pay for their cannabis out of their own pockets.

Studies using Medicaid data saw somewhat greater reductions in opioid usage.

Couple observations – there have been massive changes in PDMPs, increases in naloxone usage, tighter state laws and federal guidance on opioids (CDC et al), which may well have had some impact on death rates and lower opioid usage overall (Brian Allen of Mitchell made this point just after I wrote this). Dr Bradford noted that their analysis considered these possible confounding issues.

My big takeaway – there’s a significant reduction in the number of deaths due to opioids when states have access to cannabis. Like a 25% reduction.

Dr David Bradford of the University of Georgia presented this information; he and Ashley Bradford published much of this in a piece in HealthAffairs two years ago; they used Medicare and Medicaid data.

Dr Bradford noted he and Ms Bradford hope to be working with WCRI on a workers’ comp-specific study soon.

Mar
23

WCRI on Physical Medicine

Posted by Joe Paduda on Friday, March 23rd, 2018 | Comments

Physical medicine – chiropractic, occupational and physical therapy – accounts for about one out of every six dollars of workers comp medical spend.

Key takeaways from DR Rebecca Yang’s discussion of the latest CompScope(tm) report:

The location of PM services has shifted from hospital outpatient to non-hospital locations since 2003.

PM accounted for almost 18% of WC medical costs, with non-hospital totaling 14.6%.

Part of the reason is likely reimbursement; non-hospital care averages $41 per unit, while hospital is almost 50% more expensive at $60; this varies quite a bit by state.

Anecdotally, several payer clients have told me their PM costs have been increasing; some are concerned and others see this as likely – and not unwelcome. This latter group sees PM as a replacement or substitute for more invasive/riskier and expensive care – specifically surgery and opioids.

Don’t have any data to support these anecdotes, but hope to hear from anyone who’s looked into this.

What does this mean for you?

Increasing physical medicine costs may well be a good thing.

Mar
13

Opioids – bad news and good

Posted by Joe Paduda on Tuesday, March 13th, 2018 | Comments

Patients taking opioids over the long term don’t go back to work, yet many long-term opioid patients can be weaned off opioids within two years.

Those are the quick takeaways from two studies that came out last week.

First, a study from WCRI validates earlier research, finding:

  • patients with multiple opioid scripts are out of work three times longer than patients with no opioid scripts, and
  • patients who lived in places where providers prescribe a lot of long term opioids…are more likely to get opioids for longer periods than individuals who lived elsewhere.

This is the first study that looked at ALL lost-time claims with a diagnosis of low back pain in a very large area – 28 states that represent 80% of claims – over a five-year period. This is important because it shows  cause-and-effect independent of so-called “severity” measures, which often use cost, treatment, or prescriptions to indicate medical severity, instead of actual clinical indicators. By looking at ALL low back claims with lost time, claims, it is clear that the driver of disability is long-term prescribing of opioids.

The takeaway is this – chronic use of opioids extends disability, and you can figure out where you need to focus your efforts by looking at publicly-available prescribing data.

California is one state with way too much experience in dealing with opioids in work comp; the graph below shows both the overuse, and the progress made in the Golden State since it got serious about reducing opioid usage.

source – WCIRB

Which brings us to the good news: weaning works, as research from California’s Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau shows: 

47% of the injured workers demonstrating chronic opioid usage weaned off of opioids completely within the 24-month Study period. Injured workers who did not wean off completely over the Study period still reduced opioid dosage by an average of 52%.

The research included all patients with more than 50 morphine equivalents over at least 3 months within 24 months of the date of injury.

Yes, it is difficult, expensive, requires a lot of assistance from trained professionals, and does not always work. All that said, given the finding that patients taking opioids for longer periods are out of work a lot longer, it is well worth the time and effort to help these patients reduce or end their use of opioids.

Jan
8

Monday catch-up

Posted by Joe Paduda on Monday, January 8th, 2018 | Comments

Lots has been happening, here are a few items that caught my attention.

WCRI’s been diving deep into hospital reimbursement. This is an issue I’ve been tracking closely – and I’d suggest you should too. I see hospital/facility costs and utilization as a major cost driver; hear from Carol Telles in a webinar Thursday January 18 at 1 eastern.

As we’ve noted here previously, work comp payers would do well to pay close attention to facility reimbursement and utilization; expect work comp, auto, and other P&C lines to become even more attractive to hospitals seeking revenues and margins.

Healthcare spending inflation actually slowed significantly last year.  An analysis by Kaiser Health News indicates trend in 2016 was 4.3 percent, higher than the overall 2.8 percent inflation rate, but a 1.5 point drop from 2015’s rate.  Notably, drug cost inflation was just above 1 percent (although that’s a lot higher than the double-digit drop we’ve seen in workers’ comp).

Key point – this slowdown in the rate of growth occurred after ACA implementation.  Not surprising that costs went up; we insured millions more people, most of which had pent-up demand for services they couldn’t get or couldn’t afford.

While costs continue to grow, life expectancy declines. We have the most expensive healthcare in the world – by far – yet our life expectancy has dropped two years in a row. As a result, we rank 26th out of 37 developed countries for life expectancy.

Here’s why – we’re paying hundreds of billions for low-value care…

An excellent piece on how to make analytics actually work from Harvard Business Review.  Key points:

  • attach an ROI to the analytics unit itself
  • hire experts from OUTSIDE your industry…

Enjoy your week.

Nov
20

Post vacation update

Posted by Joe Paduda on Monday, November 20th, 2017 | Comments

Back from a much-needed family trip to Sedona AZ where the mountain biking was phenomenal.

(son Cal and son-in-law Keith plus the old guy)

Here’s what happened while I was in the land of the vortices…

WCRI’s annual conference in March 2018 will be kicked off by the former head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Dr Erica Groshen.  Always a must-do; sign up soon or risk being wait-listed for the March 22/23 event in Boston.

The latest from the brainiacs from Boston is a report on California’s work comp medical benchmarks.

Colleague and good friend Frank Pennachio of Oceanus Partners will be opining on misaligned incentives in work comp at NWCDC in Vegas next month.  Frank’s terrific delivery, vast experience and deep knowledge of how things really work in work comp will make this one of the most valuable sessions for employers.

Climate change’s effects are being felt everywhere – and the insurance industry may be the industry most affected. An excellent Harvard Business Review article illustrates the major, if not central role P&C Insurance is playing in forcing us to acknowledge the reality of human-caused climate change.

Differential pricing for high-risk areas (we’re talking about you, south Florida, and you, coastal areas) and Catastrophe bonds are just two of the ways the insurance industry is forcing businesses, governments, and individuals to deal with climate change.

Finally, NCCI’s out with it’s assessment of the 2015 decline in work comp medical costs; key takeaways (note California and New York were not included):

  • a drop in utilization of physician services was the key driver
  • inpatient facility costs increased 6 points, driven by a huge increase in very expensive inpatient stays 
  • there was LOTS of intrastate variation…

Good to be back at work – enjoy the short holiday week.

Sep
15

Friday catch-up

Posted by Joe Paduda on Friday, September 15th, 2017 | Comments

Hurricane recovery

Thanks to NCCI for a very timely article by Chief Actuary Kathy Antonello on evaluating construction contractors based on information on experience modification rates.

Key takeaway – “It’s not appropriate to use E-mods to compare the relative safety of employers.”

Very interesting take on efficiency in construction; the Economist notes that the construction industry has become LESS efficient over the last few decades. While this may well be about to change, for those rebuilding in hurricane-ravaged areas, costs will be much higher, reconstruction take longer, and preparation to deal with the obvious impacts of climate change may not keep up with the speed of that change.

Blockchain continues to work its way into the insurance industry. An excellent piece in the Harvard Business Review notes that insurance is especially suited for blockchain. Both are predicated on spreading information, and in the case of insurance, that information deals with risk. Blockchain is uniquely suited to spreading risk as at its core it is a “trust and efficiency engine.”

Key takeaway…

it will require uncomfortable transparency [from established insurers] and price corrections in their business models. This will be toughest on the portions of the industry that are the least differentiated, where consumers often decide based on price: auto, life, and homeowner’s insurance. [emphasis added]

And there’s this telling point, which identifies a key reason insurers should be worried…

trust in business institutions, and the financial services sector in particular, is at an all-time low. While the large banks are at the center of this trust vacuum — with a seemingly steady stream of scandals, such as the recent Wells Fargo account rigging debacle — the erosion of trust is bad for everyone

Ignore at your peril.

Sep
13

Motivating sales people

Posted by Joe Paduda on Wednesday, September 13th, 2017 | Comments

Is a question asked over and over by pretty much everyone in this and other businesses, but it is especially important in workers’ comp services, where companies and sales people are fighting over what’s been a shrinking pie for years.

And, except in Florida and Texas, that pie will continue to shrink.

New research provides pretty compelling insights into what works, what doesn’t, and why.

Caution – this is ONE study, in a very different culture, of a in a company selling tangible products.

The high-level takeaway…Sales force compensation is a tricky issue, requiring decisions based less on intuition and conventional “wisdom,” and more on hard, quantitative data.

Details (paraphrasing here…)

Salespeople were assigned to groups each with different compensation arrangements. Some people received unconditional bonuses, which were given irrespective of their sales performance. Some received “conditional” bonuses, where compensation was tied to sales quotas under three different treatments: standard, punitive, and real-punitive. In the standard treatment, a salesperson was paid a bonus after achieving a weekly sales quota that was set 20% higher than what that individual had previously sold. The punitive treatment was identical except for the framing: We told salespeople that failing to receive a bonus was a penalty for failing to achieve their quotas. And in the real-punitive treatment, a draw system was used, where payments were made at the start of the week but then withdrawn for those who didn’t meet their quotas.

For the unconditional bonuses, the thinking was these would encourage reciprocity; Salespeople would work harder in appreciation for the firm rewarding them with higher pay. These bonuses were awarded under two different treatments: delayed and immediate. In the delayed treatment the bonuses were communicated to the salespeople at the beginning of the week, and payment made at the end of the week. In the immediate treatment salespeople were simultaneously informed of and awarded the bonus at the start of the week.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the conditional bonuses were, on average, more than twice as effective as the unconditional bonuses… they increased sales by an average of 24%.

But it’s not that simple.

The researchers found that a conditional bonus could potentially demotivate salespeople over time: Salespeople’s performance was higher during weeks of a bonus treatment but lower in weeks after a bonus treatment. This result is consistent with past behavioral research that has found that too much extrinsic motivation may actually lead to a decrease in intrinsic motivation.

Unconditional bonuses tended to be more effective for salespeople with a higher base performance, which supports the idea that high performers generally have more goodwill toward the company and thus are more likely to reciprocate by increasing their selling effort.

Conditional bonuses were equally effective across all types of performers.

What does this mean for you?

Experiment with different approaches.  Avoid basing decisions on your gut; rely instead on data.

Aug
22

Reducing opioids CAN reduce pain

Posted by Joe Paduda on Tuesday, August 22nd, 2017 | Comments

Yes, patients can be weaned off opioids AND reduce their pain levels.

That’s the conclusion of a Vox article providing an excellent, detailed, and thorough review of a study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine Vox (thanks to Health News Review for the head’s up).

Here’s the abstract’s conclusion…

Very low quality evidence suggests that several types of interventions may be effective to reduce or discontinue LTOT [long term opioid therapy] and that pain, function, and quality of life may improve with opioid dose reduction.

Let’s parse this out.

The AIM study was based on a review of 67 clinical studies; it wasn’t “primary research.” Researchers found most of the studies on this issue had either a poor methodology or low sample size. And, relatively few were even of “fair” or “good” quality.

The 12.000 pain patients in these studies volunteered to taper off opioids; they were obviously motivated and wanted to make the change. So, it’s not possible to use this research when thinking about how to address non-volunteers as “involuntarily pulling patients off the drugs (may not) lead to similar outcomes.”

And this…

Crucially, the studies also looked at what happened when these reductions in opioid doses were paired with alternative treatments, including alternative medicines like acupuncture, interdisciplinary pain programs, and medication-assisted treatment for addiction. This is very, very different from a situation in which a patient is taken off opioids and effectively left stranded without any other form of care.

Conversely,

[the CDC concluded] there are simply no good long-term studies looking at the effects of opioids on long-term pain outcomes, while there are many studies showing that long-term opioid use can lead to bad results in other areas, including addiction and overdose.

Here’s a major point made in the study and Vox article – we HAVE to stop looking to opioids as a first-and-only line of treatment for pain.

the lack of access to non-opioid strategies may be one big reason that doctors resorted to opioids in the first place. The drugs offered an easy answer — if ultimately an ineffective one — to the many problems doctors faced, including patients who had complicated pain problems that physicians didn’t fully understand and tight schedules driven by the current demands of the health care system that made it hard to take the time to work through a patient’s individual problems. [emphasis added]

AND, we HAVE to allow/encourage/pay for alternative treatment.

What does this mean for you?

Suggest different initial treatments for pain, and get creative when helping patients who want to get off opioids.

Aug
8

Tuesday catch-up

Posted by Joe Paduda on Tuesday, August 8th, 2017 | Comments

Lots happening this August – clearly not everyone is on holiday.

One personal note – I joined the Board of Commonwealth Care Alliance, a not-for-profit healthplan serving Medicaid and dual-eligible clients in Massachusetts. CCA takes care of the toughest population in the country; the poor, disabled, elderly, homeless, and chronically ill, and they do it very, very well. There’s a lot to be done, and I’m honored to help these amazing people.

An excellent piece by Brian Klepper exposes the reality of the commercial health insurance industry – the more care costs, the more insurers make. While I would take issue with Brian’s over-generalization about how insurers make money (a percentage of healthcare costs), the implications are vast – a medical-industrial complex now consumes a sixth of our GDP.

This is part of what’s crushing middle class America, squeezing out dollars for infrastructure, education, and innovation, and enriching a few while impoverishing many.

One who just got his virtual head handed to him is Martin Shkreli, the arrogant horse’s ass who bought a tiny drug company and jacked up the price of their drug by 5000%. He was convicted on various fraud charges unrelated to the price increase.

The real lesson here is how easy it was for Shkreli to do what many others have done – make huge profits off our for-profit healthcare system. Most just do it very quietly.

Lemonade is launching in New Jersey.

This is a very, very big deal, with insurance about as different from traditional insurance as you can get.

  • Lemonade sells homeowners and renters insurance in four states and has licenses in 9 more
  • It is a Certified B-Corp – underwriting profits are donated to nonprofits picked by policyholders.
  • It makes its money from a flat 20% fee
  • Premiums belong to the insured, not the insurer. Any unclaimed or unpaid funds are returned at the end of the year at the Giveback.
  • 10% of Lemonade’s 2016 revenue went to 14 different not-for-profits

Scoff or smirk if you will – these guys and others like them will become a major force in property and casualty insurance.

Including workers’ comp…

Workers’ comp

First up, a bit more intel on the OneCall – Spreemo “deal” following up on last week’s post…Most of Spreemo’s employees will move to OCCM, with just a handful staying behind at Spreemo. It’s not clear what Spreemo will be doing in the future, but the company’s unlikely to deliver the kind of returns owner Pamplona envisioned when they invested a couple years back.

A while back NCCI published a piece on an injured worker’s catastrophic injury. Leaving aside the poor decision that led to the injury, what’s interesting to me is how the work comp insurer approached the injury – a potential amputation. While the article doesn’t get into this, my sense is if the worker had been hurt off the job, his health insurer would NOT have gone the extra mile to try to save his leg. However, because future earnings and disability are critical to work comp, his insurer – Nationwide – was very motivated to do whatever it could to keep him whole.

The estimable Ed Bernacki MD PhD and colleagues published a paper (thanks David Deitz MD PhD for the heads up) that concludes:

Occupational injury claimants 40 years of age and older with unilateral knee and shoulder symptoms ascribed to a work event tend to have bilateral age-related MRI changes. Age-related disorders should be distinguished from acute injury.

In English, we older folks have age-related problems that aren’t caused by our jobs…

 

 

Jul
19

Workers’ comp update

Posted by Joe Paduda on Wednesday, July 19th, 2017 | Comments

now that repeal and replace is dead, we can figure out what we missed while contemplating healthcare armageddon.

Workers’ comp

WCRI’s been publishing a flurry of great reports on injured worker outcomes, physician dispensing, opioids, and hospital costs. Sign up for a free webinar on outcomes here.

Coventry’s out with the second part of their work comp Drug Trends Report – download it here. This part deals with the differences between managed and unmanaged pharmacy.  Good video intro by Nikki Wilson too...

HealtheSystems is rumored to be looking to split the company in two, selling off the PBM and keeping the Ancillary Benefit Network business. With myMatrixx setting yet another high point for valuation recently, we’ll have to see if PBM prices remain stratospheric or drop a little closer to earth.

Given the myMatrixx – Express Scripts transaction had a ton of strategic benefit for the acquirer, a similar valuation for Healthe might be a tad optimistic. In addition, a very sizable chunk of the PBM business comes from one payer – the Travelers – a “customer concentration” issue that will give some pause.

BTW, I’m hearing optimism from many work comp pharma buyers about the “new” myMatrixx-ESI combination.  Guarded, but optimistic.

Medicare

Are you seeing an uptick in Commercial Repayment Center (CRC) demands coming from the Coordination of Benefits & Recovery Program? (COB&R)? A couple clients have mentioned this to me..the concern seems to be CMS is revisiting MSAs and looking for additional funds (I am likely not phrasing this correctly…Rafael, please clarify/correct!)

Physicians work for others…

About 2/3rds of younger physicians are employed.   Overall, less than half of practicing physicians have an ownership stake in their practice.

Finally, here’s a really interesting snapshot of price variation in a wide variety of healthcare markets…