Louise Esola: Comorbid health conditions are contributing to longer disability periods and substantially higher medical costs in workers compensation claims, yet the conditions often remain underreported in part due to communication gaps among patients, medical providers, and insurers and employers...

National Council on Compensation Insurance research presented in 2026 found medical payments were about twice as high for claims involving degenerative conditions, three times as high with hypertension, four times as high with diabetes and at least five times as high with blood vessel diseases.

The Workers Compensation Research Institute reached similar conclusions in a 2025 study of 930,000 claims from 2015 through 2019 across 32 states involving at least seven days of disability, finding that medical payments, indemnity payments and disability duration generally increased with the number of comorbidities.

Read the full article here.  The WCRI study that she cites is Degenerative and Comorbid Conditions in Workers’ Compensation.  Visit its page on our website for more information, including details on how to get a copy!