As headlines scream about the ravages of the nation’s growing opioid epidemic, employers are waking up to the notion that substance abuse may be wreaking havoc in a nearby cubicle — and a new tool aims to help them see just how costly that can be.
The Substance Use Cost Calculator lets employers enter their industry, location and organization size to determine how much substance abuse might be costing the company. The calculator was developed by the National Safety Council, the addiction resource organization Shatterproof and NORC at the University of Chicago, formerly known as the National Opinion Research Center, and can be found at www.nsc.org/drugsatwork.
For example, in Illinois, a 150-worker construction company — an industry with twice the national average when it comes to the number of employees with substance use disorders — could face $57,387 in annual costs from substance abuse because of lost time, turnover and health care expenses.
At a Chicago health care company with 1,000 employees, costs of substance abuse among workers could exceed $227,000, according to the calculator, which combines government data on industry- and state-specific drug use and employment costs.
Three-quarters of the 20.8 million Americans affected by substance abuse are part of the workforce, including family members of addicts, so work is an important arena to tackle the problem, said Eric Goplerud, vice president of the public health department at NORC.
And it’s in an employer’s interest to be proactive.
Employees are more likely to undergo treatment if it is initiated by an employer, and those in recovery become better workers — using less health care, taking less unscheduled leave and involving slightly less turnover than even their nonabusing colleagues, Goplerud said. Each employee who recovers from a substance abuse disorder saves a company more than $3,200 a year.
“Employers have some real skin in the game,” he said. Only about 10 percent of substance abusers obtain treatment, so if employers were to get that closer to 50 percent, which is the treatment rate for people with depression, it could mean major cost savings, Goplerud said.
Though employers have typically been uncomfortable confronting substance use in their workforce, that has started to change with parity in health insurance for mental illness and substance abuse, as well as media attention given to surging rates of opioid addiction and death, Goplerud said.
Deaths from opioids, which include prescription painkillers as well as heroin, have more than quadrupled since 1999, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Six in 10 drug overdoses are from opioids.
Illinois saw a 7.6 percent jump in drug overdose deaths between 2014 and 2015, one of 19 states with a statistically significant increase, according to the CDC. Still, Illinois’ problem pales compared to other states. Its overdose death rate was 14.1 per 100,000 people in 2015, while in West Virginia, which leads the nation, it was 41.5.
Between 2014 and 2015 in the U.S., heroin deaths increased 21 percent while death from synthetic opioids, including fentanyl, jumped 72 percent. Prescription drug deaths grew by 2.6 percent, the CDC said.
About 70 percent of businesses say that prescription drug abuse affects their workers, according to a survey released last month by the National Safety Council. Prescription painkiller abuse cost employers almost $42 billion because employees were less productive while at work or were not at work at all, the organization estimates.
Employees who abuse prescription drugs are two to five times more likely to take unexcused absences, be late for work, be injured or violent at work, file workers’ compensation claims or quit or be fired within one year of employment, according to the National Safety Council.
Prescription medication misuse is most prevalent in industry sectors where employees are likely to hurt themselves, such as construction, mining and heavy manufacturing, Goplerud said.
Less than a fifth of employers said they felt “extremely prepared” to deal with prescription drug abuse in their workplace. Only 13 percent were “very confident” that workers could spot signs of misuse, and 76 percent do not offer training on the topic.
Bob Poznanovich, executive director of business development at the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation, based in Minneapolis, said he has started to see employers lift their heads out of the sand after a long spell of denial because the rise in prescription drug abuse is hitting employed people at a higher rate than other drugs have.
“It is showing up in the cost of health care,” he said. “A lot of people who are not the traditional alcoholic are now using very addictive drugs with no intention of becoming addicted.”
He sees white-collar workers with chronic pain get hooked on painkillers and then, when that gets too expensive, progress to heroin, which is cheaper and more accessible.
Poznanovich recalls a call from a senior vice president of human resources at a large company, who said the health care costs for emergency visits related to opioids had spiked and employees were complaining that their benefits didn’t cover the type of treatment they or their dependents need.
To address the issue, Poznanovich said, employers need to work with employee assistant programs to develop policies. Those could include conducting pre- and post-employment testing for prescription drugs, teaching managers to spot addiction and developing a strategy to intervene. They also include having insurance plans that cover treatment, a system for supporting employees returning to work post-treatment and an assessment of whether its company culture encourages substance abuse.
Though many companies have taken steps to provide healthy workplaces, especially for smoking and weight loss, they are behind on substance abuse resources, Poznanovich said.
“They are often not included in the plan because of the belief it doesn’t happen here,” he said.
aelejalderuiz@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @alexiaer
