Race and outcomes in work-related back injuries

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Occupational low back injury, a significant economic and healthcare problem in the U.S., has proven difficult to manage consistently and cost-effectively. Recent studies have shown medical management of low back pain to be highly variable. With respect to Workers' Compensation, apparent disparities in assessment and treatment associated with race have also been identified. While this research demonstrated potentially inequitable treatment of injured minorities with low back injuries, the representativeness of the results and their implications for post-settlement outcomes (i.e., clinical adjustment and employability) remain unknown. This historical cohort study is designed to identify potential race-related disparities in occupational healthcare, define the scope of the problem, and to assess the impact of such disparities on post-settlement adjustment. The study will examine a cohort of African Americans and White workers who incurred disabling low back injuries in the State of Missouri and whose disability claims were settled during the year 2001. Records of the Missouri Division of Workers' Compensation (MODWC) will be used to identify those claims from three Missouri population centers (St. Louis City, St. Louis County, Jackson County), where the majority of African Americans in Missouri reside. MODWC records will provide data relevant to medical costs, temporary total disability costs, permanent disability costs, and other injury-related matters for all claimants with work-related low back injuries leading to missed work time. Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing methods will be used to assess post-settlement adjustment. Regression models will be used to assess the relationship of race and legal representation, alone and in interaction, with Workers' Compensation outcomes and post-settlement adjustment of claimants. The historical cohort design will address three weaknesses in the present state of knowledge. First, it addresses potential associations between race, treatment, and disability outcomes, an area that has been neglected. Second, it addresses relations among the above constructs and the post-settlement adjustment of claimants. Moreover, because of the sample size and the design, we will be able to separate the effects of potentially confounding variables (e.g., job type, socioeconomic status), both alone and in interaction with race. Finally, by dint of the procedures needed to recruit participants, the study will establish a cohort of injured workers whose adjustment can be monitored not only at the time of this study, but potentially beyond that time frame. If the cohort is examined at a later point in time, it will be possible to track true long-term outcomes of occupational healthcare.