Doctors Handling Personal Injury Cases

The PI Masterclass for Doctors
The Mastering Personal Injury Cases DVD set provides doctors the highlights of Trial Guides' intensive Personal Injury Conference for Doctors. This set provides a comprehensive understanding of the insurance and legal issues involved with motor vehicle cases. The set features two of the top motor vehicle trial lawyers in America who will teach you about things that no other personal injury seminar for doctors considers.
Two of America's leading motor vehicle lawyers, Peter Anderson and Aaron DeShaw, address the following topics:

• Minor impact cases


• Ways to get your claims out of an insurer's minor impact unit


• The special investigation fraud unit, and how you can avoid it


• The problems caused by direct referral program auto body shops


• Your role in the insurance and legal process of your patient's claim


• Overcoming the most common defense attacks on you and your patient


• The critical importance of quality chart notes


• And much more.

Even if you have provided care to injured people for years, you may know very little about how auto insurers really handle your patient's claims. Understanding this information is necessary to help your patients obtain larger settlement offers so that they can pay for your care, and receive the future care they need.

The Mastering Motor Vehicle Cases DVD set contains nearly 10 hours of highlights from the first advanced Trial Guides seminar dedicated to motor vehicle cases. It features two of the world's leading authorities on traumatic injuries - epidemiologist, doctor, and crash reconstructionist Dr. Arthur Croft, and Yale Medical School biomechanics researcher Dr. Paul Ivancic, along with doctor/trial lawyer Dr. Aaron DeShaw (best known for his groundbreaking work on the Colossus insurance program).

While this video comes from an exclusive attorneys-only event, the material provides doctors with cutting-edge information on the research behind motor vehicle collisions and the traumatic injuries that result from them. In addition to covering a wide variety of issues related to injury causation, accident reconstruction, and typical defenses associated with all types of auto cases, this set also addresses challenges specific to minor impact cases.

During the presentation, Dr. Croft dismantles the insurance company myth that every PI doctor faces repeatedly—that all patients who sustain a traumatic spinal injury recover within 6-12 weeks. Instead, Dr. Croft teaches you that there are zero scientifically valid studies that support that position. He then shows how there are 89 peer-reviewed studies published since 1955, showing long-term chronic pain after a spinal injury sustained in a motor vehicle collision. This part of the presentation is worth the price of the set alone.

Dr. Ivancic discusses the most recent research conducted at Yale Medical School regarding spinal traumatic injuries even in "minor impact" trauma. Other unique parts of the program include Aaron DeShaw's presentation addressing the role that auto body garages and their "direct referral program" agreements with insurers can result in your patients' cases being designated into the "Minor Impact" unit of an insurer through improper cost-cutting procedures.

This video will take you from the fundaments of insurance claims to much more advanced topics, giving you the information necessary to get your patients fair compensation for their losses and overcome the insurance companies' junk science.

The content of this set is completely different from the materials on the Mastering Personal Injury Cases DVD set.

Defense Medical Examiners (often erroneously referred to as “IMEs”) are hired by the insurance company or a defense lawyer to either terminate your patient's care or say they aren’t really injured. This doctor isn't seeing your patients to help them, and they are not on your side.

Unlike most Trial Guides products aimed at doctors or lawyers, the Preparing for a Defense Medical Exam DVD teaches your patients about the tricks insurance doctors play in their efforts to discredit your patients' honesty, take away their ability to receive the treatment they need to recover, and destroy their insurance claims. These doctors might act like your patient's friend, but they get repeat business because insurers know they will testify against the patient in exchange for insurance company money. Often they make hundreds of thousands of dollars per year, and others over a million dollars per year denying the claims of injured people, all while avoiding any personal liability for unfounded and improper opinions.

This video gives your patients examples of the medical history and examination procedures so they know what to expect before they walk into the defense doctor's office. It provides your patient with the best chance of being viewed as credible and truly injured after an injury.

This video is hosted by Karen Koehler, one of the United States' leading trial lawyers and an attorney who is dedicated to helping injured people. She will lead your patients through the defense medical examination process and teach them how to avoid the common traps set by insurance doctors. In this video, attorney Koehler includes tips on:

• Honesty in the history and examination


• How the defense doctor and staff watch patients to catch them faking an injury


• Patients giving their best effort, without getting hurt

The outcome of a defense examination is intended to terminate reasonable health care, and destroy the patient’s personal injury claim. But some of the insurance doctor tricks are easier for the patient’s lawyer to reveal as biased or improper. Given that credibility is so important in the outcome of personal injury claims, this video assists the injured person in providing the most honest and credible presentation possible during their interaction with the insurance doctor.

You can use this video with every patient subjected to a defense medical exam – providing a unique benefit to your patients involved in personal injury claims.

With nearly 350 published articles, multiple books, and a long running continuing education course on traumatic injuries to his credit, Dr. Arthur Croft is one of America's leading experts in the study of auto crash injuries. With over 20 years of research comes his most recent book—Whiplash and Mild Traumatic Brain Injuries—covering every aspect of traumatic auto injuries from muscle strain to traumatic brain injury. Dr. Croft outlines the most recent research on cervical acceleration/deceleration injuries, other spinal injuries, extremity injuries, and traumatic brain injuries. Croft explains the mechanics of rear end crashes versus side impact, versus front impact, and debunks "junk science" surrounding the "minor impact" defense. Diagrams and illustrations accompany the more complex explanations. Dr. Croft further details testing, diagnosis, and treatment of injuries, along with suggestions for common problems that injured people face in insurance disputes.

A successful practice involves more than just treating patients. It requires successful business management. This book is aimed at helping your clinic thrive in a competitive environment.
Author John Morgan is the founder of the largest personal injury law firm in America—Morgan & Morgan, which has over 400 lawyers and 2,000 staff in multiple states. He has written two books on practice management. His second book, You Can’t Teach Vision, has gained a following from doctors who want to build and expand their clinics.

A doctor who has owned over 10 clinics during his career noted, “I have attended practice management seminars for decades, and consulted with leading practice management professionals since the 1970s. With that background, I can tell you that You Can’t Teach Vision is probably one of the best business books for doctors that I have ever read. This book will take doctors through all of the important steps of taking your practice from the beginning and making it a huge success, while focusing on great customer service. While Morgan is talking about achieving success in the legal field and in his other business ventures, nearly all of the same concepts apply to building a successful clinic or group of clinics.

"This is a book that just kept getting better and better as I read, and once I started reading it, I couldn’t put it down. I have no doubt that if you read and apply the business principles in this book, you will be phenomenally successful in your career.”

The AMA Guides is the standard of care for determining permanent impairment.  Owning the book, and reviewing the ways in which permanent impairment ratings are determined, allows you to understand when a patient has an injury or symptoms that result in a permanent impairment rating.  Secondarily, the book is very helpful when preparing to testify about the defense doctor’s determination that there is no permanent impairment.  In many cases the defense doctor has failed to follow the standard of care of reviewing the AMA Guides when they determined your patient had no permanent impairment.  Be prepared for the defense to say that the AMA Guides only pertain to workers compensation claims – something expressly disproved in the opening chapters of the Guides.

Please note: We do not recommend the AMA Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment, 6th Edition, both because auto insurers continue to use the 5th Edition, and because the 6th Edition is sufficiently controversial and flawed, that it should not be admissible in trial.

This is the first, and perhaps the most notable book on traumatic spinal injuries ever written for doctors. It is only low on our list as the 3rd Edition is out of print and at this point somewhat dated.  If you can find a copy you should buy it. If not, the best alternative is Dr. Croft’s more recent book Whiplash and Mild Traumatic Brain Injuries discussed above.