News Outlet Presents Stories of Workers' Comp 'Hell'

Wednesday, December 13, 2017 | 0

An investigative report in the Honolulu Civil Beat, a nonprofit news site that produces watchdog journalism, describes the “hell” that workers can be plunged into in Hawaii’s workers’ compensation system: becoming homeless while waiting for an insurance company to authorize benefits, contemplating suicide as treatments are denied time and again, and losing all semblance of a normal life.

The report marks more bad press for the workers’ compensation industry, which has seen its fair share of stories in recent years recounting workers’ struggles to stay afloat in a confusing bureaucratic system they feel was “set up to break them,” as the Civil Beat puts it.

The Civil Beat shares the story of Kolen Kauwulu, whose life has been derailed since he injured his knee at work in 2007. SeaBright Insurance Co. called off his knee surgery three days before it was scheduled, saying it needed more time to investigate. When the insurer rescheduled nine months later, a surgeon advised Kauwulu against it because changes in his knee rendered the procedure useless.

SeaBright denied Kauwulu’s request for aquatic therapy, and surveillance by the insurer’s investigators ensured Kauwulu couldn’t perform activities that used to bring him joy and give his family of six some extra cash: working side jobs as a mason, and coaching his kids’ baseball and football teams.

Forced to rely solely on wage-loss benefits that paid a fraction of his salary, he and his wife had to cancel a house purchase and move somewhere cheaper. When that grew too expensive, they moved in with his parents.

Meanwhile, Kauwulu — restless, unhappy and unable to exercise or work — gained a substantial amount of weight. His insurer then denied a request for a knee replacement and lowered his impairment rating because he was obese.

Kauwulu’s story was one of many shared in Tuesday’s Civil Beat story, which is the first in a series on workers’ compensation. Reporter John Hill writes that the system requires workers to give up their right to sue, but in exchange, “workers can become enmeshed in a system of complex rules and hardball tactics that looks much like what they would have found in a courtroom.”

Hill also writes that insurance companies wield substantial power in the state Legislature and have successfully fought off a dozen attempts to require both sides of a workers’ compensation case to agree on the doctor to examine an injured worker.