A significant number of work injuries in Georgia involve back injuries. Unfortunately if you are being treated by a “posted panel” doctor, your treatment may be delayed or not taken seriously. In this video, I discuss certain “red flag” issues that demand immediate treatment with a spine specialist whose focus is your well being.
Filed under Back & neck injuries, Case studies, Medical benefits, Medical Care, Understanding the Law by 
Have you ever wondered how an insurance adjuster can influence your authorized workers’ compensation doctor? If you work in an industry where employees often get hurt, or where work injuries are likely to be serious, you can be certain that your employer’s insurance company has directed the human resource director at your company to include specific doctors on your company’s posted panel. Insurance adjusters know that physicians who derive most or all of their income from workers’ compensation referrals will be much less likely to keep you off work or order expensive tests.
The problem, of course, is that delays in needed tests, or delays in needed treatment can result in permanent injury to you. Further, if a panel doctor returns you to work and you are unable to perform your duties, you are likely to be fired putting you in a difficult financial situation and psychologically deterring you from pursuing your rightful benefits.
In this video I discuss a case where the authorized doctor flat out ignored his own physical therapist’s conclusions about my client’s very limited use of her arms, and issued a full duty return to work. I won’t let the insurer get away with this, of course, but I wanted you to see how broken the workers’ compensation medical system has become. I’d be willing to bet that this doctor knows that he was not living up to his oath to offer full and complete treatment to his patients, but his interest in making money and seeing those referrals seems to override his conscience.
Filed under Arms & Hands, Case studies, Medical Care, Understanding the Law by
Would you be surprised if I told you that those photos you uploaded to Facebook, or that video of your child’s basketball game now playing on YouTube, or even your restaurant “check-in” on Yelp could cost you thousands of dollars and seriously undermine your workers’ compensation case? Unfortunately all of these things have happened to men and women pursuing work injury claims in Georgia.
If you did not realize this already, understand that privacy in the United States is pretty much dead. If you participate in social media like:
- My Space
- Yelp
- Tumblr
- Wordress (blogging)
- Blogger
- YouTube
- and many more
information about your life can be available to anyone who is looking. And you can bet that insurance adjusters and insurance defense lawyers are looking. While private eye surveillance is still used, insurance defense adjusters also run searches for you on various social media platforms. If they see you running, jumping, lifting or doing anything inconsistent with your claimed injury, they will use that video, photograph or post as grounds to cut off your benefits.
A colleague of mine tells the story of a client of his who decided to video her son’s high school wrestling match and thereafter uploaded to YouTube. At one point the video shows the claimant climbing bleachers, then jumping up and down to cheer her son. Unfortunately this woman was asserting a job injury to her hips and lower back that she claimed was disabling. When confronted with the video, she insisted that the wrestling match was a one-time event and that she ended up in bed for a week thereafter. The workers’ compensation judge did not accept this argument and upheld the insurance company’s termination of benefits. A case that could have settled for $50,000 to $75,000 ended up settling for nuisance value of less than $5,000.
Don’t let this happen to you. If you are pursuing Georgia workers’ compensation benefits, close or suspend your social media activities until your case is over.
Filed under Georgia Workers' Compensation by
Perhaps no other element of a workers compensation case gives rise to as many questions as the subject of when and how to settle your case. In my opinion the timing of settlement negotiations can greatly influence the outcome of your case. Settle too soon and you may end up paying out of pocket for expensive medical services. Wait too late and your case can grow stale if the insurance company can calculate with certainty its exposure on your case.
Generally the best time to settle your case is when significant uncertainty remains regarding your future medical and lost wage eligibility. Remember – insurance companies are in the business of risk management. If we can show them that your future medical costs could soar into the tens of thousand and that your return to full duty work could be far into the future, they will be more likely to offer more money to eliminate that risk.
I tell my clients that identifying that “sweet spot” is more art than science. Sometimes a single line in a medical record, or a brief comment from my client will tell me that we are entering the zone where my client’s medical condition is stabilizing but enough unknowns remain for me to put forth a settlement demand that will result in a fair and generous settlement.
Filed under Maximizing your settlement, Winning Strategies by
