I see you getting better as one of my most important functions as your personal injury lawyer.
I will ask you, every step of the way, what your doctor wants you to be doing in order to progress with your recovery. If you don’t know, I will insist that you ask.
If you are attending for some sort of therapy, I will ask you what your physiotherapist, massage therapist, chiropractor, prolotherapy practitioner, pain specialist or other treating medical professional wants you to be doing in between sessions in order to accelerate your recovery. If you don’t know, I will insist that you ask.
If your family doctor has put your care in the hands of a treating medical professional, I will ask you if your doctor has any ideas for what else you might do in order to accelerate your recovery, in addition to whatever that therapy might be. If you don’t know, I will insist that you ask.
At some point, assuming you are in capable medical hands, “active rehabilitation” will be prescribed. Active rehabilitation consists of stretching, strengthening and cardiovascular exercises. I will ask you if you are perfectly clear about the exercise regime that will best promote your recovery, including what the exercises are and how long / often they would best be performed. If you don’t know I will insist that you ask.
Most of this medical care costs money. I will help you figure out how to afford it, recommending a “beg, borrow steal” approach. If you exhaust your resources, I will “find a way”.
As the pace of your recovery slows, and eventually stops, I will encourage you to be assertive with your medical team. If whatever cocktail of medical care you are having is no longer bringing about further recovery, you need to be assertive about finding alternative care that will.
I will actively discourage you from continuing to attend for care that is no longer getting you better. There’s no point spending time and money on something that isn’t bringing about results.
If your family doctor runs out of ideas, I will ask you to request a referral to a specialist who might have some tools that are not available to your family doctor.
Ironically, this leadership or “coaching” role in getting you better as quickly and as fully as possible results in a reduction of my fees. My fees are a percentage of the value of your claim and claim value goes down the more you recover.
I learned early on in my personal injury practice that aggressively pursuing recovery builds the very best foundation for achieving fair financial compensation for whatever injuries and losses you end up stuck with for the rest of your life.
By doing so, you avoid the inevitable finger-pointing by the defending insurance company, accusing you of being the author of your own misfortune for failing to do everything you could to get better.
You also avoid the “magic pill defence” that crops up in the medical reports of specialists hired by the insurance company to defend your claim. If absolutely every possible medical care option has not been attempted, the defence specialist is likely to come up with something that hasn’t been tried. The specialist will claim that following through with the prescribed care will bring about a cure.
Defence medical reports are often obtained too late to be able to follow through with the new “magic pill” care recommendation before a trial. You therefore run the risk of a judge or jury buying into the defence specialist’s optimism and under-compensating you for your future losses.
Getting better is always a good thing. It also happens to help you achieve justice.
Published October 15, 2014 in the Kelowna Capital News
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