A new study from the California Workers’ Compensation Institute confirms that the use of medical provider networks is at an all-time high.  (Unable to resist making a sarcastic remark, your humble blogger will note that an unrelated study recently confirmed that water is wet, fire is hot, and businesses prefer taking advantage of favorable laws rather than tossing bags of money into a bottomless medical-industry pit.)

The study reviewed medical visit data from over one million claims with a date of injury from 2004 to late 2010, and evaluated whether those visits were to MPN doctors.  Since MPNs became available to insurance companies and self-insured employers and groups, the number has grown drastically, such that MPNs “accounted for more than 75 percent of all first-year, physician-based outpatient services rendered on” 2009 date-of-injury claims.

It is no closely-held secret that I am a big fan of MPNs.  They protect the employee from prescription-happy fraudsters, and they provide some defense against nutty professors for the employers.  But the greatest indication that MPNs work is found in studies like these – employers and insurance companies have their life-blood, dollars, on the line.  The fact that their defense of choice is the MPN is a testament to its effectiveness.