Workers Comp Zone

A Partner at Boxer & Gerson LLP, Julius Young has practiced worker’s compensation law and social security disability law since 1979. He has represented thousands of individuals who have sustained life-changing injuries or illnesses while on the job. In every case, his goal is to secure the medical treatments his clients need.

March 28, 2011

BAKER'S DOZEN

The transition is well underway from the Schwarzenegger era. Although the Governor’s attention is laser-focused on how to deal with the budget, his people are beginning to focus on whether they should “blow up some of the boxes” that Arnold never got around to blowing up. That’s one of the themes of an interview (posted […]


March 25, 2011

COMP'S GOT TALENT 3.0

As I’ve said before, comp’s got talent. Earlier posts featured Ralph Paterno of Boxer & Gerson and the Golden Gate Gypsy Orchestra, populated by several workers’ comp QMEs. Today we feature Mark Vickness, an applicant attorney friend and colleague of mine in Oakland. Vickness’ band is called Glass House (www.glasshousemusic.org), which features the keyboards and […]


March 23, 2011

A USEFUL TOOL

A federal government website on product safety has gone live:http://saferproducts.gov/Default.aspx The site, sponsored by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, may be useful to many workers. Concerned about the safety of that tool you are using at work? Dependent on that device that a co-worker is using? Suspicious that the product being used may have […]


March 22, 2011

READER REACTION (with corrections)

Note: this post includes a correction to an earlier version of this post;;; I’m not surprised that I received some response to my recent post, “The Outliers”, which focused on a recently released study of opioid prescribing practices in California workers’ comp. That study, by the insurance industry’s California Workers” Compensation Institute, has been picked […]


March 15, 2011

WHAT IF? WORKERS' COMP AND EARTHQUAKES

The video we’ve been seeing coming out of Japan’s earthquake ravaged region is some of the most spectacularly disturbing ever seen. The Hollywood spectacles like Independence Day and Deep Impact were really on to something, as we see humankind and its constructions tossed around like crumbs. From the blog’s mailbag comes a question: what about […]


March 9, 2011

BROWN REACHES AGREEMENT WITH STATE JUDGES & ATTORNEYS

Governor Brown and CASE, the union representing California Administrative Law judges and many state attorneys, have reached a tentative agreement on a new contract. The contract, which will affect workers’ comp judges and state attorneys, would end furloughs but require one day of unpaid leave per month. Approval by CASE members will be required for […]


March 8, 2011

THE OUTLIERS

A few doctors doing an outsized share? Where have we heard this before? In 2010 CHSWC taught us that 3.9% of QMEs, often with sham “offices” in dozens of zip codes, were conducting 40% of evaluations :http://www.dir.ca.gov/chswc/Reports/2010/QMEstudy.pdf That’s a supersized share. Now, courtesy of a CWCI study, we learn that the top 10% of doctors […]