I recently observed a plaintiff attorney cross-examining the defense medical expert in a medical malpractice trial. The plaintiff attorney obviously had not used a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant because most CLNC® consultants would have advised him that the case was not meritorious.
The son of the deceased woman was suing for failure to timely diagnose lung cancer. The decedent was a no-show for a follow-up visit and was unresponsive to a letter from the defendant doctor requesting that she set an appointment. The plaintiff attorney was trying to make the case that the doctor should have jumped through more hoops to get the woman to come in for an appointment.
The first indication that the case was going badly for the plaintiff came when the jury wouldn’t look the son in the eye while leaving the courtroom for breaks. When the case went to the jury for deliberation, they rapidly came back with a defense verdict. They obviously believed that her comparative negligence was the real cause of her death.
This experience is a good reminder that there are still attorneys who truly believe they can analyze the medical records themselves and/or rely only on their medical experts. The defense verdict in this case proves that Certified Legal Nurse Consultants are not a luxury – they are a necessity.
Attorneys need you whether they know it or not. The school of hard knocks is a tough way to learn and I hope this attorney learned a valuable lesson from this expensive loss.
I’m Just Sayin’
P.S. Comment and share cases where an attorney needed a CLNC consultant and lost because he didn’t use one.
