How record review actually works

For attorneys

• How Law Firms Use a Medical ChronologyWhat a medical chronology is used for at each stage of a case: intake, the demand, discovery, the expert, the deposition, and the settlement table.
• Treatment Gaps in Medical Records: What They Are and How Each Side Uses ThemA treatment gap is any stretch with no documented care. What counts as one, why both sides care, and how a chronology tells a real gap from a missing record.
• How to Read a Medical Record for a CaseThe record types in a typical production, where the facts that decide cases are found, and the reading habits that separate a chart read from a chart skimmed.
• Preparing to Depose the Opposing Medical ExpertAn opposing expert's report is a list of claims about the record. How to check each one, find the factual errors, and build questions the expert has to answer from the chart.
• Prior Injuries and Pre-existing Conditions: How the Record Reveals ThemWhere prior complaints appear in a production, the difference between a pre-existing condition and a prior injury, and why the question is what changed, not what existed.
• What the Medical Summary in a Demand Package Should IncludeThe adjuster will check the story against the records attached. A medical summary built from the whole record, with the specials reconciled to the notes, is the one that gets paid.

For IME physicians

• What Goes Into an IME ReportThe sections of an independent medical examination report, what each one has to do, and the habits that keep a report intact under cross-examination.
• How to Become an IME PhysicianWhat independent medical examination work involves, who hires examiners, the credentials that get referrals, and how to build a practice that survives its first deposition.
• How IME Reports Get Challenged, and How to Write One That HoldsThe seven attacks that discredit most examiner reports in deposition, in the order lawyers use them, and the drafting habit that prevents each one.
• Reviewing a 3,000-Page Record Before an IMEThe records arrive Thursday and the exam is Monday. A working method for getting through a large production without missing the page that matters.
• Writing About Causation and Apportionment Without OverreachingThe two opinions every referral asks for and every deposition attacks. How to reason to them from the record, state them to the right standard, and mark their limits.

For claims professionals

• How Claims Adjusters Use Medical Record ReviewWhere a clinician's read of the file changes a claim decision: reserving, the demand response, the IME referral, and the files that never needed a nurse at all.

Plain answers

• Medical Record Summary vs. Medical Chronology: What Is the Difference?A summary condenses the record. A chronology organizes it in time. Which one a case needs, when both are the same document, and what each should cost.
• Who Should Review Medical Records: Paralegal, Nurse, PA, or Physician?What each kind of reader catches and misses, where the cost lines fall, and why the answer is usually a clinician for the reading and a physician for the opinion.
• How Long Does Medical Record Review Take?Five business days is the standard for a full clinician review. What takes the time, what rush actually changes, and how to order so the completion date is a commitment rather than an estimate.

Plain answers

• What is a medical chronology?The document at the center of record review: what it contains, who uses it, and what one costs.
• What does medical record review cost?Per-page pricing, what drives the count, and how to estimate a case before you commit.
• Outsourcing record review for examining physiciansWhy IME physicians hand the reading to a clinician team, and what comes back.