5 Ways Legal Nurse Consultants Assist with Medical Mass Torts

Litigating a mass tort case can be wrought with overwhelming amounts of information to decipher and understand. Legal Nurse Consultants from Mednick Associates, prove their value to litigators at the outset of these cases.

Defending or prosecuting medical mass tort cases requires long-term discipline, an array of research, and from an administrative standpoint, organization. Many law firms that handle these cases require, at the outset, a way to organize the vast array of case files and medical records.

Mednick Associates, a legal nurse consulting and medical expert witness company, has an extensive array of legal nurse consultants (LNCs) who assist with this process. Their LNCs have been instrumental in providing medical advice and case organization to litigators, nationwide. Below are a few ways their LNCs assist with medical mass torts.

1. Case Chronology: Once the medical records are retained, the process of summarizing and organizing the documents begins. Most lawyers and paralegals do not have the time nor training to pull apart the medical facts of a case, display them in a timeline and extract significant facts along the way. A well-created chronology will last the life of a case, be used at many different junctures and set up either the defense or prosecution to prove their case. It is a first and crucial step.
2. Defense assistance: LNCs act as a siphoning agent for defense attorneys. As they review the records they are able to answer specific questions the defense may present, thus making an argument to dismiss a potential plaintiff. For example, they may scan the records to determine if the plaintiff is a smoker or obese, factors that may exclude them or provide an argument for their dismissal.
3. Plaintiff assistance: For the prosecution, the LNC performs a vital function of reviewing the records for specific patterns or ailments that may result from a particular drug, medical device or treatment. These trends are what increase the population of plaintiffs, thus making the case stronger, more difficult to refute and easier to obtain a medical expert witness.
4. Case organization: In addition to a chronology, a simple but vital task is simply organizing the medical records. A well-organized medical record, with tabs, references and placed in the correct order saves a litigator many frustrating hours.
5. Time: All of the above examples lead to one conclusion. Having an LNC review a mass tort medical record saves the attorney multiple hours of otherwise billable time, or for a plaintiff attorney, time spent working on their case. The initial upfront investment has proven to be well worth it for many litigators.

Different medical mass torts are initiated at various times, but they all have one thing in common, multiple records, multiple plaintiffs and varying degrees of difficulty. A LNC cuts right through the maze for a litigator and clearly outlines their case, the medical facts and guidance on how to proceed once the facts are objectively measured. Mednick Associates and their network of LNC’s can be reached at 203.966.3000 or via https://mednickassociates.com.