The reforms are having an even greater impact for self-insurers than insurance companies. "The 2004 results for self-insured clients are off the charts," CAS quoted Ms. Garland as saying.

According to the Garland Composite Index of Self Insured Clients, accident year 2004 saw a 26 percent decrease in the average reported claim versus a 14 percent increase in 2003. Average paid claims decreased by almost 20 percent, and the number of claims per adjusted payroll decreased by 14 percent compared to the prior year.

The CAS report said Ms. Garland noted that despite the potential "clouds on the horizon," including some California legislators stating that reforms went too far in reducing benefits, "leading indicators look favorable.".

Katrina Zitnik, director, workers' comp, for Costco Wholesale, provided the attendees with the perspective of a self-insurer. With a third of its employees in California, two-thirds of its workers' compensation costs in California and 2,100 claims per year, the reform legislation "is a big issue for the company," CAS quoted her as saying.

Ms. Zitnik reviewed the main elements of the reform legislation and noted that "the ACOEM (American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine) Guidelines are an excellent trend for workers' compensation and are the most important part of the reform," CAS reported.

Ms. Zitnik, according to CAS, said guidelines allow "nurses to negotiate treatment plans with doctors that make sense." She added, "Workers' compensation costs affected the bottom line of Costco and changed the way I managed."

The reform legislation and a new approach, including more attention to actuarial issues to eliminate surprises, resulted in Costco's loss rate dropping from 7.1 percent in fiscal year 2004 to 5.6 percent during the first part of fiscal year 2005, according to CAS.

Joanne M. Ottone, consulting actuary for Towers Perrin, CAS said, described what actuaries expect to see in the data as the reforms take effect and how actuaries may adjust loss data to measure the reforms' actual impact.

"We are likely to see and have already seen lower medical costs due to new medical fee schedules and utilization guidelines," Ms. Ottone said according to CAS.

CAS said she explained that measuring the impact is difficult because the data actuaries are seeing now is a mixture of pre- and post-reform data. Restating the data as if the reforms had been in effect since the beginning of an accident period helps to avoid distortions. Adding the adjusted reserve estimates to unadjusted paid and reported claims provides data with an appropriate mixture of pre- and post-reform results.

"Actuaries need to take into account the impact of reforms in their work," Ms. Ottone was quoted as saying.

The primary goal of the Casualty Actuarial Society is to provide education and research to help its members become leading experts in the evaluation of hazard risk and the integration of hazard risk with strategic, financial and operational risk.