In May, we posted a blog focused on ‘consensus reporting,’ a practice defined by Law Times as “having an expert summarize the reports of all the other experts in a personal injury case.” The practice, which is well known to Ontario personal injury lawyers, had come under harsh scrutiny following a libel suit launched by Toronto physician Dr. Howard Platnick against former Ontario Trial Lawyer Association (OTLA) President Maia Bent. In the case, Platnick claimed Bent had hurt his business by warning fellow lawyers about his questionable impartiality.
Justice Sean Dunphy rejected this argument and wrote in his decision that Platnick’s medical consensus reports were “not an objective summary of the underlying medical reports themselves so much as a summary of the conclusions reached” by the doctor. In other words, Dunphy found that Platnick tailored the reports to favour his clients, who were often auto insurance providers.
On December 1, 2017, the Globe and Mail published a lengthy article on the auto insurance industry’s practice of hiring medical professionals to produce biased reports on accident victims, and Platnick was once again implicated. The article presents him as a model example of a doctor who profits from producing slanted medical reports.
“In Ontario and B.C. alone,” the article reads, “hundreds of Canadian doctors take in roughly $240-million a year collectively, putting their names to accident injury assessments for the auto-insurance industry.”
The investigative report is based on a Globe and Mail review of roughly 300 court and arbitration decisions on car accident cases in Ontario and British Columbia. It found that assessment companies acting as middle men hire physicians to perform independent medical evaluations (IMEs) on insurers’ behalves. The assessment companies take a cut of the fees – which are drawn from drivers’ premiums – and the insurance companies use the biased reports to limit benefits and treatment payouts to accident victims.
While the paid doctors and insurance companies profit from this practice, the individuals represented by Ontario personal injury lawyers are left to suffer.
“Some legitimately injured accident victims suffer and deteriorate for years without money for proper treatment, while insurers send them to a merry-go-round of doctors, all well paid to keep challenging them on whether they are really injured,” the article reads.
The Ontario personal injury lawyers at Neinstein Personal Injury Lawyers have been representing seriously and catastrophically injured Ontarians for decades. If you have been injured in an automotive accident, contact us today to arrange a free, no-obligation consultation and learn how we can help you access compensation.
Greg Neinstein
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