Helping Injured Employees Return to Work

It’s time to get back to your normal life;

Welcome to the Worker’s Compensation Division of Emerging Insights

A note from Dr. Ferragamo

I enjoy my job. Although sometimes I’d rather sleep in, I actually miss my work and even feel a bit sad when I take too much time off. Originally I figured that I was a bit of a workaholic, but when I began serving patients receiving worker’s compensation services, I found out that most people would rather show up for work than be kept at home.

If you have seen the rest of my site describing my private practice that is geared towards longer-term services for the LGBTQ+ community, you may be feeling a bit confused. You may be asking, “why is this guy who really enjoys providing open-ended psychodynamic psychotherapy also in the worker’s compensation field?” To put it simply, helping injured workers is actually quite aligned with my social justice values.

I did not originally intend to pursue a career as a worker’s compensation provider, but while working as a contractor for another worker’s compensation agency, I found myself feeling surprisingly moved by conversations with my patients. I realized what an honor it is to serve the folks who truly keep society from falling apart - first responders, nursing assistants, school secretaries, sanitation workers, public transit employees (yes, even the person who gave me a parking ticket last month), private security guards, clerical workers, et cetera, et cetera. If that means providing brief, solution-oriented therapies to solve specific problems efficiently, then so be it.

Most of my patients are honest people who were just trying to do a good job, and ended up becoming physically hurt and/or traumatized. However, navigating the worker’s compensation system to get the help one needs can be stressful, confusing, and sometimes even demoralizing. It is my hope that the Emerging Insights Worker’s Compensation Division can provide stable, consistent, and efficient support to the workers who support us all.

How we can help

  • A licensed clinical psychologist provides a thorough and efficient initial evaluation to determine the work-relatedness of the injury and the appropriate diagnosis. An individualized treatment plan is created for each patient on the basis of the findings of this evaluation.

    During the initial evaluation and treatment planning process, we take into account each patient’s individual personality, environment, personal history, historical and cultural context, religious beliefs, and value system. Understanding each patient as a whole person is essential for providing appropriate care.

    We also do our best to learn about the context in which the work injury occurred. We try to get enough information about the surrounding workplace culture, job duties, and pre-existing personal challenges to be able to create a feasible return-to-work plan during the treatment planning process.

  • Although it may seem counterintuitive, psychotherapy can be useful for reducing time spent away from work. For example, a study by Wizner et al (2021) found that workers with PTSD who participated in mental health services (e.g., psychological assessment and psychotherapy) were out of work for the least amount of time.

    Our team may utilize the following evidence-based approaches to treat folks with PTSD:

    • Cognitive Processing Therapy

    • Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing

    • Mindfulness-based therapies

    • Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

  • Although we think about pain as something that happens to the body, there is ample evidence that physical pain (especially chronic pain) is both a somatic and psychological phenomenon. The experience of physical pain can be exacerbated by emotions such as stress, fear, anxiety, depression, and anger.

    Psychotherapeutic approaches such as Pain Reprocessing Therapy can actually change how physical pain is experienced in the body.

  • Languishing for months or years on temporarily totally disabled status is not helpful for anyone.

    Our patients’ recovery is our top priority. According to our model, successful recovery includes a speedy return to what life was like before the workplace injury occurred.

    We create individualized return-to-work plans in order to help patients resume their usual and customary work duties as soon as possible.

    We carefully monitor the progress that each patient is making towards restoration of their occupational functioning, and we adjust work letters accordingly.