Claim Causes

Workers' Compensation Risk Management Top 10 Causes of Injury

  1. The top-ranked cause of injury was overexertion, defined as injuries from excessive lifting, lowering, pushing or pulling of an object.
    Such injuries accounted for $10.3 billion in direct costs - 25.5 percent of the total.

    The other nine injury causes, ranked by direct costs, are as follows:

  2. Falls on the same level
    $4.6 billion (11.5 percent of the total) Bodily reaction (injuries resulting from bending, standing, reaching, and slipping or tripping without falling) - $3.8 billion (9.4 percent).
  3. Falls to a lower level
    $3.7 billion (9.2 percent).
  4. Struck by an object (such as a tool falling on a worker from above)
    $3.4 billion (8.5 percent).
  5. Repetitive motion
    $2.7 billion (6.7 percent).
  6. Highway accident
    $2.4 billion (5.9 percent).
  7. Being struck against an object (such as a worker walking into a doorframe)
    $1.7 billion 4.3 percent).
  8. Becoming caught in or compressed by equipment
    $1.6 billion (4.1 percent).
  9. Contact with temperature extremes
    $400 million (1.0 percent).
The survey to assess employer perceptions about workplace injuries queried 200 executives - 125 from mid-sized companies (those with between 100 and 999 employees, and commercial insurance premiums up to $2.5 million) and 75 from large firms (those with over 1,000 workers and commercial premiums of at least $2.5 million).