by Elizabeth Rudolph | Mar 22, 2018 | Legal Nurse Consulting
As a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant, you just got your first pile of medical records in a nursing malpractice lawsuit. You have been asked to organize them. Where do you start?
Organized medical records impact so many aspects of a case. First, as a PLNC, you will rely on the medical records and knowing where to find key documents is essential. Next, attorneys and the legal staff rely on them both in pretrial and trial proceedings.
Follow this Professional Legal Nurse Consultant roadmap to medical record organizational success:
- Clarify the instructions: Have you been asked to “Bates” stamp them – a paginated identifying numbering system. Have been asked to put them in a certain order – chronological or reverse chronological order. When does the attorney want the organized medical records back – once you get the deadline, consider how to return the medical records to the attorney.
- Compile the documents by sections: Proceed to put all medical records pertaining to a specific department, or event, into one stack, usually in chronological order. Continue to do this with the entire medical record.
- Gather all sections into one bundle: Put the multiple stacks into one complete pile beginning with what you would think would logically be the first section and proceeding to completion. You might want to follow the lead of how your hospital or employer organizes their medical record. In absence of a clear method, put them in the most local sequence.
- Bates stamp each page beginning in the bottom right corner: If the right corner is taken, or would require obscuring items in that corner, opt for the bottom left corner. If the left corner is taken, next look to the top right. If the top right in occupied, use the top left. Remember to Bates stamp each page in the same location, if possible.
The medical records are now ready to be placed into a binder. Punch the holes for binder insertion either along the left-hand side in a three-ring approach or at the top using a two-ring approach. Usually the law firm will provide the binders, but these can easily be purchased from an office supply company and reimbursement can then be sought.
If an index is requested, insert this before the medical records. Be sure to list each section by name and Bates stamp number where that particular section begins. An organized medical record is essential to a thorough review. Now, you are ready to move on to the next Professional Legal Nurse Consultant assignment.
by Elizabeth Rudolph | Jan 3, 2018 | Legal Nurse Consulting
So, you want to create your own schedule instead of working each holiday, alternating weekends, and summers. You have skills as a nurse that you would like to use and you have always enjoyed hearing about the law. Your favorite T.V. programs include Judge Judy, Law and Order SVU, and reruns of Boston Legal. How can you work for yourself using your nursing skills and include your passion for lawsuits? Be a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant (PLNC)!! Think about these three self employment options:
- Money: You want to earn lots of money. There are bills you need to pay, vacations you want to take, places you want to go but you need cash. You need cash now. Being certified as a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant is the perfect fit.
- Time: You want to be with your family. You want time off. You need down time. When you are working for yourself as a PLNC, you own your own time. You decide when to take a case, you decide when to review the medical records, you decide when to put together your report, you decide when to send your invoice to the attorney to get paid.
- Self-esteem: As a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant, you are valued for your expertise. You went to nursing skills for a reason, and here is the time you can actually use those skills – in legal cases. You are valued for the knowledge you have or can acquire. You are, in essence, the teacher and the attorney is the pupil. You get to explain nursing skills in layperson’s language. You get to translate the medical abbreviations and jargon. You are driving the case because you, as a nurse expert witness, are an essential part of the case.
It’s your time. Own it. Be the Professional Legal Nurse Consultant (PLNC) you always wanted to be. In just 2 days, you will be legal nurse certified. Now that’s what I’m talking about.
by Elizabeth Rudolph | Jul 3, 2017 | Legal Nurse Consulting, Marketing
Do you want encouragement to do things you want to do? If you’ve ever wanted to be a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant, just know that it is within your reach. You want inspiration, motivation, illumination? Then, you’ve come to the right place. If you are a nurse, you can be a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant. Here is what is in store for you as a legal nurse consultant:
1. You can make lots of money. It is up to you how much you make. Once certified as a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant (PLNC), you can review medical records for money. How many you decide to review and how much you want to charge for your review is up to you.
2. You can live the life you’ve always wanted. As a PLNC, you are valued for your nursing judgment. Your opinions matter. You express those opinions and get paid and valued for them. With more cash and more appreciation for your skill set, you can do with it what you wish.
3. You can find a treat in each case you review. This means, the more you find, the more valuable you are as a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant. You are respected, highly regarded, and appreciated as a legal nurse. You are able to use the skills you went to school for. And, when you contribute your expertise to cases, you are rewarded.
Just remember this: Love what you do as a PLNC and in each case you review, you’ll find a treat!
by Elizabeth Rudolph | Jan 16, 2017 | Legal Nurse Consulting
Tax season is here. Now is the time to think about how to save money in your Professional Legal Nurse Consultant (PLNC) business. Before you know it, you’ll be filing taxes again. For those legal nurse consultants with years of experience, you know what this means. For those of you who are beginning this journey, let’s simplify a bit.
First, the disclaimer. This is not meant as tax preparation or financial advice. Always check with a tax professional or Certified Public Accountant if you have questions.
Now, on to the ideas to make April 15 just another day for legal nurse consultants:
- Keep your receipts. If you haven’t been doing this up to now, it’s a good time to start. Simply write the date and purpose of each receipt on the back and put it in an envelope or box.
- Organize your receipts. This is not the huge mess you might think. You have two options. You can throw all your receipts into a single box or bag and sort them at the end of the year or have three or four general categories and sort them as you go. These categories could include: meals, gas, supplies or utilities.
- Keep clear financial records. Do you use Microsoft Money or Quickbooks to track your expenses from day to day and month to month? If not, use check registers that show deposits and withdrawals. At the very least, have your bank statements handy.
By knowing what you earned and what you spent, you can get a clear picture of the health of your legal nurse consulting practice from year to year at tax time.
by Elizabeth Rudolph | Dec 23, 2016 | Legal Nurse Consulting
If you are a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant (PLNC) working on medical malpractice or nursing home negligence case, you will undoubtedly have to deal with medical experts or other nursing experts in some form. Many states require that the attorney have consulted an expert prior to even filing a lawsuit.
So, how might you, as a nurse and PLNC, find yourself entangled with the other medical or nursing experts in a case?
First, you may be asked to help locate an expert. This means, you would need to narrow the field of expertise needed in a case, then locate a qualified physician, nurse practitioner, or other medical or nursing expert to review and provide an opinion about that particular aspect. Doing so does not have to be hard. In fact, many expert directories are available online. Additionally, you can often use a search engine to find practitioners in a certain field.
Next, you may be asked to go over case facts, as they apply to the medical records, with an expert prior to his or her deposition. You may even be asked to sit in on initial expert meetings with the attorney. These meetings may be in person or via conference call. It is imperative that you have the necessary information at hand for such expert meetings.
Finally, you may be asked to review an opposing expert’s deposition testimony to help the attorney grasp the implications of their findings. Medical and nursing terminology can be confusing, and your knowledge of both is a benefit upon which the attorney will reply.
by Elizabeth Rudolph | Nov 15, 2016 | Legal Nurse Consulting
As a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant, odds are that the hardest part of the job is getting clients. Especially that first client. How do you do it? There are any number of answers to that question. But we are going to focus one easy to accomplish step:
Talk to Everyone
This sounds like a no-brainer, but people are generally unwilling to toot their own horn. Don’t be one of those people. We aren’t suggesting you go around bragging to anyone and everyone that you are now a PLNC and, therefore, walk on water. No, rather, we suggest that you find any and every opportunity to mention your new Professional Legal Nurse Consultant career path and discuss it with others. Let the subject come up in conversation naturally, but don’t miss your opportunities to mention your work.
For example, the nurse in you starts talking with your next door neighbor as you both retrieve your mail.
“Hi there,” you say.
“Hi. How are you?”
“I’m great. Working on this new business of mine.”
“Really, what business is that,” your neighbor asks.
You now have an opportunity to give a little information about your Professional Legal Nurse Consultant business. Also, have that PLNC business card handy to pass along during these types of conversations.
What is the point of telling everyone, including attorneys, about your new career path? You are planting seeds. A popular theory in social science is that we are all only six degrees, or six other people, from anyone else on this planet. With that in mind, you pass your card to your neighbor. He puts it in his wallet. His boss mentions that his daughter just went to work at a big local law firm. So your neighbor passes the card to his boss, as much to get it out of his wallet as anything, but it helps you, no less. The boss asks his daughter if she knows what a PLNC is. She does and he gives her the card. Two weeks after you talk to your neighbor, you get a call from this large law firm. And so it goes.
Don’t be a braggart, but don’t be shy about letting the people you come in contact with know are are a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant. You never know who they might know.
