Highest Claims Come from Most Common Workplace Accidents
A recent analysis of workers’ compensation claims revealed that some of the most common workplace accidents turn out to be the costliest.
The authors of the Travelers 2024 Injury Impact Report, as reported by the Insurance Journal, analyzed 1.2 million claims from 2017 to 2021. The most frequent causes of injury were overexertion (29%), slips, trips and falls (23%), being struck by an object (12%), motor vehicle accidents (5%) and caught-in or caught-between hazards (5%), which are defined by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration as Injuries resulting from a person being squeezed, caught, crushed, pinched, or compressed between two or more objects, or between parts of an object. These also represented the costliest claims at $250,000+, with slips, tips and falls being the second most expensive.
Findings were based on claims where workers needed medical care and could not immediately return to work. Many included long-term, sometimes permanent injuries. These types of injuries are prevalent in the construction industry, which continued to maintain the greatest average number of lost workdays per injury at 103 workdays, up from 99. By comparison, the average missed workdays from injured employees overall was 72.
Inexperience, workforce shortages, and maintenance issues were contributing factors to the accidents. First-year employees are still the most at risk for injury, accounting for 35% of claims.
Sometimes an accident is just that…an accident. But sometimes, poor risk management or safety protocols put workers needlessly at risk. If you have been hurt on the job due to negligence, contact a top Philadelphia construction injury attorney to discuss your legal options.