Helping Workers Who Develop Medical Problems Stay Employed: Expanding Washington's COHE Program Beyond Workers' Compensation

This is one of three policy action papers prepared in Year 3 of the Stay-at-Work/Return-to Work Policy Collaborative, an initiative funded by the Office of Disability Employment Policy in the U.S. Department of Labor.

Each year, millions of workers in the United States lose their jobs or leave the workforce because of a medical condition. Keeping them in the labor force could help them stay productive, maintain their standard of living, and avoid dependency on government programs. In this report, we discuss one option: expanding a successful case coordination system developed for Washington workers with medical conditions that are job-related, and therefore compensable under workers’ compensation, to the same workers when they experience conditions that are not compensable under workers’ compensation. We examine the feasibility of such an expansion and how to conduct a pilot test.