We have been obtaining proofs for mass torts since 1986. At first glance it sounds like an easy proposition to do it in-house, but in reality it can be a little more complicated: doctors retire, move, or die and take their records; clinics and hospitals are bought by other entities or they shut down; pharmacies close down or are also bought by other companies. Sometimes they keep the records, and sometimes they send them to other storage facilities; and that’s not even including good old hospital bureaucracy and clerk’s power trips! I can list hundreds of examples of how easily a simple task like obtaining records can turn into a very complicated task and take an obscene amount of time.
Our firm has many more resources at its fingertips. If a doctor retired, we will find his home; if a clinic or hospital no longer exists, we have databases and experts at using them to figure out who is now responsible. Hospital bureaucracy? We will contact the clinic owner or hospital director at home if needed.
And to conquer the good old-fashioned bureaucracy?
We have a call center for our records department that starts at 6AM PST/9AM EST and stops at 5PM PST, covering business hours for all states in the U.S. We will also call every couple of days to follow up and make sure they understand the urgency in obtaining the medical records within a reasonable amount of time.
Most importantly, it will not cost your firm a penny because it is an expense, just like the price of copying the records is an expense.
Below I will list a few of the roadblocks we have encountered.
We had a doctor who wrote a letter that stated he never prescribed Zyprexa. We then found the owner of a small pharmacy that had closed, and he produced the records showing that the same doctor had prescribed Zyprexa for 2 years! Sometimes, doctors are afraid of liability.
The law firm had requested full records from a hospital, but it didn’t show the drug in question being prescribed; the client swore the hospital gave it to her. We called the hospital supervisor and explained the situation. They checked again and found that they had not included the prescription documents because they were in another department.
There was a doctor who retired and took his records with him. We found him in another state, living in a cabin. We convinced him to go through his records in his attic and he gave them to us.
Many records were lost in Katrina. We went through great lengths to find doctors, and we found some of them in a different state. After learning about our arduous efforts to locate them, they were willing to sign affidavits based on memory alone.
Let us help you get the most out of your advertisement dollar and settlement negotiations. We find them, contact them, and reason with them to return the documents you need.