Instead of juggling all of the various parties within the workers' compensation world — physicians, hospitals, nurse case managers, pharmacies, physical therapists, insurance carriers and claims adjusters — employers would be far better off working with a third-party administrator, according to ESIS' whitepaper, “Why Employers Should Consider Integrated Medical Programs to Manage Workers Compensation Costs.”

“By connecting all programs, people and sources of data together, a wealth of real-time information can be accessed, aggregated and analyzed,” writes Veronica D. Cressman, ESIS' senior vice president, medical programs. “Employers and their TPA partners are able to detect unusually lengthy claim durations, evidence of fraudulent and inaccurate healthcare provider billing, and other inflated costs, arming them to take actions to quickly resolve these issues.”

However, if an employer works with multiple vendors, the information needed to efficiently identify wasteful medical procedures, skyrocketing drug expenses and unusually long claim durations is buried in multiple data systems and processes, “impeding data analysis for actionable purposes.”