Report: Workers’ Comp Fusions are Less Successful, More Expensive

Workers’ compensation claimants don’t recover as quickly or as well as non-workers’ compensation patients, according to a new study described in the June 15, 2015 edition of the Journal, Spine.

The study compared workers’ compensation patients who had undergone cervical fusions against non-workers’ compensation patients who had submitted to the same procedure. The workers’ compensation cohort demonstrated lower clinical improvement, reduced 1-year arthrodesis rate, and an increased incidence of revision/ reoperations when compared to the non-workers’ compensation patients.

A greater proportion of comp patients were cigarette smokers, which may help explain some of the findings. Moreover, healthcare reimbursement rates were significantly higher in the workers’ comp cases.