CMO Breakfast 

ALUCA CMO BREAKFAST / medical journal club and peer review

In August this year ALUCA kindly convened a ‘CMO breakfast’, bringing together medical staff working in the life insurance industry. The events are intended to occur every two months and will rotate around insurer and reinsurer offices.

The goal of the meeting is to promote evidence-based insurance medicine through discussion of evidence (a journal club), and to promote peer review and support through discussion of cases. There is a huge need to provide a forum to discuss relevant new evidence and provide peer support.

20 CMO’s or medically trained staff working in life insurance attended the first event held at Munich Re. The first meeting had a cardiac theme with discussion around the updated fourth universal definition of myocardial infarction, introduced in 2018. There was also discussion of the diagnostic challenges faced associated with type II myocardial infarctions (supply demand infarctions). There was also discussion of recent evidence indicating there should be caution interpreting the 99th percentile upper reference limit for cardiac troponins. All highly relevant to life insurance.

The breakfast case discussion revolved around a TPD claim (de-identified), a health professional suffering from fibromyalgia, a challenging condition. The group discussed the challenges associated with assessing claims like these, and inconsistencies in what is apparently reported to claims assessors and what appears to be reported to AHPRA (Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency) in terms of impairment preventing practice.

The next meeting is scheduled for the 7th of November, it will be held at the offices of SCOR in Sydney. We have a guest speaker, Associate Professor Les Barnsley, a rheumatologist (kindly provided by ALUCA platinum sponsor MLCOA). The theme will be rheumatoid arthritis, the course of the condition, newer treatments and how effective they are.

Dr Matt Paul is an Occupational and Environmental Physician with 20 years’ clinical experience and is the Chief Medical Officer at Munich Re (Australia)