As a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant, you will often have to put your thoughts and findings into writing. This may intimidate you, whether you are a nurse, physician, attorney or another other professional. Why? Because many of us hear our elementary and high school English teachers in our heads as we sit down to write:
- Your writing needs work.
- Use proper grammar.
- Work on your spelling.
These are just a few of the admonishments we heard in nursing school. But you are no longer in school and no one is grading you. That said, your written materials do need to do their job. The better you write your PLNC reports, the better you will serve your attorney. Scared? Don’t be. Writing does not have to be chore. And it does not have to read like a nursing or legal textbook.
Make your writing easier in three simple steps:
- Brainstorm
- Freewrite
- Revise
That is all there is to it. Once you do those three steps, you have a expert witnessreport you can confidently share.
Another way to approach writing is to write the way you talk. If you have trouble with this, try recording yourself as you give the clinical review report as you would if the attorney was sitting in front of you. Then, you can transcribe the recording, make small revisions and you are ready to provide your nursing merit report.
