La. and Calif. on Opposite Ends of Prescription Cost Spectrum

Louisiana, a state with a high rate of opioid prescribing, had the highest prescription cost per workers’ comp claim for 2015 injuries among 18 states featured in a series of studies by the Workers Compensation Research Institute. Louisiana also had the highest number of prescriptions per claim in WCRI’s CompScope medical benchmark reports, released last month. In contrast, the studies found that California experienced a 14% decrease in prescription payments per claim in 2015, compared to 2011. The decrease, the largest among the 18 study states, was the result of ...