The South Carolina Hospital Association plans to use data to address the growing issue of workplace violence, an effort that could ultimately affect workers’ compensation claim frequency and severity.
The association announced it has hired South Carolina-based Antum Risk, a workers’ compensation insurer and data firm, to monitor incidents of violence at health facilities in the state.
“This will provide South Carolina’s hospitals and health systems with actionable data to implement strategies to advance workplace safety and prevent acts of violence,” the association said in a news release this week.
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that workplace violence has climbed significantly in recent years, particularly against health care workers. In 2018, health workers accounted for 73% of all nonfatal workplace injuries that came from violent acts, the association noted. Some 44% of nurses have experienced violence, the group said.
The Antum program will include a self-assessment that allows health care facilities to evaluate incidents and benchmark their data against other hospitals to better understand trends and best practices to reduce violence.
“We’ve known for a long time that workplace violence is a serious problem for our members, but as an industry we have often been unable to zero in on where we can make the greatest impact,” said Lara Hewitt, vice president of workforce and member engagement at SCHA.
Antum said it was founded in 1977 by South Carolina health care executives as a workers’ comp self-insurance pool and is now one of the larger providers of comp coverage to the state’s healthcare industry.
Topics Carriers South Carolina
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