More than six months after the City Council agreed to try to cut back on the number of police officers out on injured leave, that number has jumped to a new high.
As of Friday, there were 26 officers on the "injured in the line of duty list," compared with 18 out on leave on an average day last year.
City Solicitor Christine O'Connor said the city Law Department, which manages city employees' injury claims, does not keep records of past injury lists and thus could not determine whether 26 officers out at the same time set a record, but she acknowledged the number is "higher than we would like it to be, absolutely."
Last June, the City Council voted to spend $50,000 this year to contract with a doctor who specializes in occupational health and orthopedics, as well as a case-management nurse, to review so-called chapter 111F claims, named after chapter 41, section 111F of the Massachusetts General Laws. The law allows firefighters and police officers injured in the line of duty to collect salaries tax-free until returning to work.
By contracting with nurse Joanne Sargent and Dr. Richard Zimon, the occupational health and orthopedic specialist, the city is able to prioritize cases and then have a specialized city evaluator recommend treatments for them.
The new review process is now being applied to those on the injury list, O'Connor said.
Sargent has gone through all the injury files, she said. Those on the list are now being given appointments with Dr. Zimon, chosen for his specialty because many of the injuries are bone-and muscle-related. He will examine the patients and develop healing strategies for them.
"We wanted to have somebody ... take a look at these files and maybe come up with other suggestions and other treatments that might help officers return to work quicker," Sargent said. "Where there have been, quote, slow healers, maybe there's a way of trying another type of treatment where it might speed things up, for their own sake."
The council's vote last June came in response to a study by city lawyers that found police officers and firefighters injured in the line of duty over the past five years had missed nearly 200,000 hours of work while earning $5 million tax-free.
Councilor Rodney Elliott, chairman of the council's finance subcommittee, plans to make a motion at tomorrow night's meeting seeking an update on the new approach to managing the claims.
"We need these officers on the street," he said. "Not only are we not getting the police protection, but then we've got to pay overtime to back-fill those shifts. It's a burden to taxpayers, and we're not getting the best bang for our buck."
The oldest injury on the Police Department list was suffered by Officer Daniel Otero in December 2001, when he slipped on snow and hurt his shoulder while getting out of the police van.
The longest-tenured firefighter on the list was Robert Carroll, who suffered an on-the-job heart attack last May, according to Fire Chief William Desrosiers.
Desrosiers said Carroll is in the process of retiring.
The other firefighter on the list, Gerald Allard, was hurt Jan. 18.
Meanwhile, Otero is now joined on the list by his sister, Officer Norma Otero, who was hurt in July 2004.
There are two other pairs of family members on the police list: Officers Melissa and Thomas Bellefeuille, who are husband and wife, as well as Thomas Tetreault Sr. and Thomas Tetreault Jr., who are father and son.
Officer John Boutselis, president of the Lowell police patrolmen's union, said there are "seasonal peaks and valleys" in the injury list.
"There's not really much we can do about it," he said. "It's the nature of the business."
Sounds like Dr. Winter-off was busy this season....
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