Work Related Injuries

 


Work-Related Injuries and Workers’ Compensation Insurance

Every week new patients come to us with problems or injuries that started at work. Almost none of them know enough about the facts and laws that apply in this area. First, the law states that you are entitled to fully paid-for treatment to get well. Here is a quick rundown of the most important points.

• You are entitled to get prompt examination and treatment (that is "reasonably necessary to cure or relieve") for a work-related health problem. Your treatment can be medical or chiropractic; both are covered.

• Your health situation could have happened suddenly in an injury with an exact date and time (like a fall or lifting injury), or it could have happened gradually ("cumulative trauma or repetitive stress injury") as in a computer operator with wrist or hand pain or numbness.

• A doctor needs to reasonably conclude that 50% or more of the cause was from work. It is not required that you were actually doing your work, or doing it properly. You could have been standing on your head in your workplace’s parking lot (probably not in your job description) and if you got injured, worker’s compensation insurance must cover your injury.

• Any part(s) of your body are covered. An injured back, neck shoulder,elbow, wrist, hand, hip, knee, ankle or jaw are all covered.

• If your employer wants to exert medical control, and determine which doctor, clinic or emergency room to send you to, he has that right (for the first month). Or he can let you go where you wish, if he agrees. Many do.

• After one month of the employer or insurance company exercising medical control and selecting your doctor, you are entitled to make one choice of your own physician (anyone that you want) if you feel their choice was not the best, or not really doing the job. This is your right.

• We can usually get prompt authorization for you to get treated by the excellent team at our office. We can do that whether yours is a new workers’ compensation case or an old one. We can also do it whether you have an attorney or not. And we can do it even after you have already made your first choice of doctors.

• If you provide the name of your personal doctor to your employer (keep a copy of your letter for your records) any time before an injury occurs, then the employer loses his right to medically control you, and you can go to your personal choice from the start.

• Your treatment under worker’s compensation does not require that you stop working. If your injuries do require that you take a break from work, or have work limitations on things you can’t do, while still working, your doctor will specify temporary disability (with monetary payment) or give you work limitations.

• The Worker’s Compensation system can be a dream or a nightmare. When the insurance company treats you fairly, it is a dream, and covers 100% of costs of diagnosis and treatment. If they decide to fight you or send you to poor doctors, it can become a nightmare of hassles.


• There are other benefits of worker’s compensation that are available when appropriate. These include retraining when a person’s injuries stop them from going back to the same type of work, or settlement money to compensate a person who has been permanently injured. Our office will work to assist you to get the fair treatment you are supposed to receive, and to arrange all necessary details.


We feel that your first priority is to get to the right doctor for your injury or cumulative trauma, get treated properly, and get well. We have seen many instances where patients have been poorly and ineffectively treated before getting to us, and spent years in needless pain and disability. We take pride in helping injured workers whose doctors told them they could never be well again. We have restored even those with failed surgeries. Once you get to us, we want to see you recover rapidly and completely. That is our unwavering goal.

 

 
Gordin Center - Universal City Medical Group, Inc.

3535 Cahuenga Blvd West-Suite208
Los Angeles, CA 90068

Tel: 323-436-0303
Email: ucmg1@yahoo.com

 

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