In the course of your recovery, your family doctor may want to send you to a specialist such as an orthopedic surgeon or physical and rehabilitation specialist. You should be cautious about who you see because often times, the specialists tend to be optimistic in your recovery or downplay the extent of your injuries. It is their job to be positive. Also, they see you for a very short period of time and may not accurately record your history.
As a result, ICBC often gets a hold of the consultation reports because they will find their way into the family doctors clinical records. These consultation reports tend to provide ICBC and its defense counsel with a lot of ammunition.
For example, if you have a pre-accident back injury and it is not noted in the consultation report, the defense lawyer may turn around and suggest you are hiding that information from the specialists even though the topic was never raised in the appointment.
Also, ICBC tries to rely on the optimistic outlook of these specialists or the fact the specialists have downplayed your injury. ICBC will argue that the treating specialist is unbiased and so the viewpoint of the specialist should be accepted over the one obtained by you or your lawyer.
Like ICBC, lawyers acting for plaintiffs have a list of certain experts that provide more favorable opinions. From your ICBC case perspective, the better approach is to have a specialist involved in the case who is picked by a lawyer not by your doctor. Of course, there are exceptions such as where you require a specialist early on for surgery or immediate attention for life threatening injuries.
If you follow the approach of making sure you see only a specialist that will not hurt your case, you can minimize the problem of ICBC getting an unfavorable consultation report and using it as a “smoking gun”.
If your family doctor wants you to see a specialist and you have hired a lawyer, contact your lawyer and discuss the issue. If you do not have legal representation, this may be a good time to go for a free initial consultation with a lawyer.
