HB2479 HD1

Report Title:

Workers' Compensation; Vocational Rehabilitation

Description:

Expands eligibility for vocational rehabilitation to workers who are deemed unable to return to their regular jobs and are not offered work at the pre-injury earnings level. (HB2479 HD1)

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	H.B. NO.	2479
TWENTY-FOURTH LEGISLATURE, 2008		H.D. 1
STATE OF HAWAII

A BILL FOR AN ACT

SECTION 1. Section 386-25, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended by amending subsection (b) to read as follows:

"(b) The director may refer employees who may have or have suffered permanent disability as a result of work injuries or who have otherwise been deemed unable to return to their regular jobs where the employer has made no offer of suitable work that would restore the employee's earnings capacity as nearly as possible to the level that the employee was earning at the time of injury, and who, in the director's opinion, can be vocationally rehabilitated to the department of human services or to private providers of rehabilitation services for vocational rehabilitation services that are feasible. A referral shall be made upon recommendation of the rehabilitation unit established under section 386-71.5 and after the employee has been deemed physically able to participate in rehabilitation by the employee's attending physician. The unit shall include appropriate professional staff and shall have the following duties and responsibilities:

(1) To review and approve rehabilitation plans developed by certified providers of rehabilitation services, whether they [be] are private or public;

(2) To adopt rules consistent with this section that shall expedite and facilitate the identification, notification, and referral of industrially injured employees to rehabilitation services[,] and establish minimum standards for providers providing rehabilitation services under this section;

(3) To certify private and public providers of rehabilitation services meeting the minimum standards established under paragraph (2); and

(4) To enforce the implementation of rehabilitation plans."

SECTION 2. Statutory material to be repealed is bracketed and stricken. New statutory material is underscored.

SECTION 3. This Act shall take effect on July 1, 2008.