Case Evaluation Archives - Page 3 of 5

27May2014

There’s No Space for Vigilantes in Legal Nurse Consulting

It is critical to stay detached when you’re analyzing medical-related cases as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant. Our job is not to be a vigilante for injured people or the protector of overworked, underpaid registered nurses. Our job is to give an objective viewpoint of the merits of the case. Sometimes that means telling a defense attorney that the case is meritorious. And sometimes it means telling a plaintiff attorney the case has no merit despite unfortunate injuries.

13Mar2014

8 Strategies for Consulting on SANE Cases

In consulting on sexual abuse cases as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant I’m often reviewing many hundreds of pages of records. I’ve learned that the greater the volume of records to review, the easier it is to waste time figuring out where to start and how to begin. My strategy for efficient and accurate analysis is as follows:

Identify the available documents. You may receive documents (either hard copies or on a disk) already categorized into files. It’s helpful to list on a Word^® document the following: “I have reviewed the following documents from your office pertinent to xxx case” and then list the available documents according to the name on disk or paper file. Next to the name, list the date or time period covered by that document. Once you have the documents listed, you can review them in whatever order is helpful to you. Other times when you’re consulting on a SANE case you may receive a disk with one file numbering several thousand pages. In that case, skim through to begin a cursory identification of the file contents and list headings on your Word document such as psychiatric hospitalization at [facility] from [date] to [date].

22Jan2014

Tom’s Tech Tip: Same Tickets – Different Shows

Over the Christmas holiday Vickie and I attended the Broadway show “No Man’s Land” starring two of my favorite actors – Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart. We purchased our tickets late and so were sitting back a little further in the theatre than I normally prefer. Also, my contacts were a little dry and dirty after a day on the streets of New York City. And did I mention I was a little sleepy? Why am I making these excuses? Simple – because of what comes next.

17Jan2014

Certified Legal Nurse Consultants: Be Wary of Premature Opinions

When analyzing medical records as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant one thing is certain – medical records lead to more medical records. Sometimes it’s the additional records that hold the answers to the issues in the case. Savvy CLNC consultants don’t jump the gun, delivering opinions prematurely.

7Jan2014

Plaintiff Attorneys Don’t Pursue Every Case and Here’s Why

Contrary to popular belief, plaintiff attorneys don’t pursue every medical malpractice case that comes through the door. They have to be selective because they only make money if they win or settle the case. Considering a plaintiff attorney will invest $100,000-$200,000 to get a case to trial, losing is a pricey proposition. The more successful the attorney, the more selective he will be about the threshold level of damages he’ll expect to recover in the case.

4Oct2013

This Isn’t It! What CLNC® Consultants Can Learn from the Michael Jackson Trial

A defense verdict was rendered after three days of deliberation in the 5-month-long trial of Michael Jackson’s survivors versus his promoters.

20Jun2013

My Most Memorable CLNC® Case: A Book About Patients’ Rights Settled the Case

My most memorable case was the very first one. For this, I received a 4 ft. tall stack of medical records which chronicled the final year of the patient’s life. The attorney contacted me after he had already determined the issues. That was too bad because, while the plaintiff was suing an acute rehabilitation unit within the hospital for the death of her husband, some of the problems were also incurred in the general hospital. An expanded focus might have addressed those issues.

2May2013

My First Case Came Down the Chimney with Santa

The one case I’ll always remember is my first case. Two days before Christmas, a defense attorney hired me to consult on a breast cancer case. On Christmas Eve a large box of records was delivered to my door.

19Apr2012

Tampering with the Electronic Medical Record (Or Not)

The electronic medical record (EMR) is becoming omnipresent in the healthcare system. But EMR tampering issues in medical-related cases are a brand new frontier. It’s rare for Certified Legal Nurse Consultants and attorneys to peek behind the EMR curtain, but in the case of Samuel Sweet versus UPMC University Hospital we get to do just that. I first ran across this case last year, when the judge ordered the trial delayed after a local newspaper article about the case and the alleged tampering was published just before jury selection.

Category: Case Evaluation