Incorporating domestic violence screening into workers' compensation and occupational medicine histories

A number of orthopedic, internal, and psychological conditions often alleged as being due to workplace injuries can be explained by episodes of domestic violence in the workers' homelife.

Domestic violence comes into the workplace with the affected worker. Not only are many victims of domestic violence harassed, stalked, and injured at work, but fellow workers are often incidental victims of this violence as well.

This presentation will explore the ways in which the adverse health effects of domestic violence often manifests itself in the form of workers' compensation and group health claims, costing employers significant resources in terms of productivity and capital. Some estimates place the cost of lost productivity alone at nearly $750 Million dollars per year. The cost of medical treatment for the effects of this violence is another $4 Billion, much of it paid for by employers.

Without a formal structure for detecting these non-industrial occurrences, the domestic violence is usually not uncovered as part of the forensic medical-legal medical examination of the worker.

This presentation examines ways in which employers can incorporate effective screening mechanisms into the treatment and evaluation of workplace injuries and use the employee's contact with the occupational medical setting as an effective opportunity to detect family violence and – if appropriate – offer resources to the employee.