In the scramble of a medical emergency at work, do you escort the injured person to the hospital in a company vehicle, call an ambulance or request first responders to bring in a helicopter?

It’s a difficult call with far-reaching health and financial ramifications, and now — for the first time in the workers’ compensation industry — Wayne-based GENEX Services has comprehensive guidelines to help answer those critical questions.

The nation’s leading workers’ compensation clinical services provider is rolling out its new research-based GENEX Transportation Guideline to all customers, including the 381 Fortune 500 companies that use its services.

“The underlying criterion when determining whether ambulance transportation is needed is whether or not it is necessary for the health of the claimant,” GENEX Services Medical Director Maury Guzick said in an announcement.

“Clearly a worker with a traumatic injury, such as a burn or loss of limb, requires an ambulance – perhaps even transport by air – but sometimes the need is less clear, and then we use the clinical and research-based guidelines to help make the decision.”

Among GENEX Services research findings, “emergency ambulance transportation costs can exceed $1,100 per mile, non-emergency costs are more than $700 and helicopter use can be as high as $41,000,” the article stated.

The new Transportation Guideline joins 343 other “evidenced-based, proprietary guidelines created to help its case managers, adjusters and customers better manage claims.”

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