Propagating the new work disability paradigm for disability benefits & workers' comp systems

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We are grateful for the financial support provided to The 60 Summits Project by our Charter North American sponsors Prudential Financial and Webility Corporation.

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North Dakota

North Dakota held four Summit meetings during the week of September 10, 2007, in Grand Forks, Bismarck, Fargo, and Dickinson.

When the head of North Dakota's workers' compensation state fund -- Workforce Safety and Insurance (WSI) -- was sent a preview copy of the new ACOEM Guideline on Preventing Needless Work Disability by Helping People Stay Employed, he immediately saw how it could help WSI deliver improved service and challenged his staff to start implementing some of ACOEM's recommendations in their practices and programs.

Once The 60 Summits Project was started, he decided that North Dakota would participate.  WSI was the sole sponsor and host for a series of 4 summits held in September, 2007.  Meetings occurred in Grand Forks, Bismarck, and Fargo, each of which have roughly 100,000 people in their metro areas, as well as Dickinson with about 30,000.

Local employers and healthcare providers were personally invited to attend, along with WSI staff and contracted nurse case managers.  The turn-out was excellent with approximately 85 attendees in each of the larger towns, and almost 50 in Dickinson.  Many good ideas came out of these community-based conversations for how to improve the way the stay-at-work and return-to-work processes functions -- and its outcomes.

In their post-Summit evaluations, more than 80% of attendees agreed that:

  • the workshop had been a good use of their time and effort,
  • they got some new ideas about how doctors and employers can exchange information and actually help ech other make better decisions,
  • having met people at the workshop will help them in the future,
  • they wanted to be part of any follow-up activities.

To download a copy of WSI's report of the proceedings and outcomes, click here.

Following the four Summit series, WSI held a similar set of events internally, with their own staff.  More good ideas were produced.  At present, despite significant organizational changes, WSI is analyzing and prioritizing the results of the community workshops as well as the results of their internal workshops, and will be devising a workplan for 2008 and on-going.

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