General Advice

Who Should Provide Medicolegal Reports?

Experts.

That sounds like a glib response to the question but it does contain some truth.

It is a Special Calling

Medicolegal reporting is a subspecialty in its own right. For many years it was viewed by aged and retiring orthopaedic surgeons as an avenue to supplement an income into retirement. As the surgical clinical practice evaporated, and in the absence of healthy superannuation portfolios, some of our aged colleagues experienced a financial pinch after retirement. They would drift into medicolegal reporting, relying upon decades of clinical experience, imposing untested and sometimes erratic views upon the Courts.

That is not to say that all retiring orthopaedic surgeons behave so badly. In fact, some of them have been extremely valuable and accurate medicolegal reporters.

The point is that age and clinical experience alone are insufficient to guarantee excellence in medicolegal reporting. A good reporter will also have experience within the medicolegal arena. He or she will be a regular attender at medicolegal conferences, subscribe to medicolegal journals and be open to constructive criticism and advice from all members of the joint professions.

The best medicolegal reporters are those who enjoy providing medicolegal reports, do engage in continuous medicolegal education and are open to the ever-expanding horizon of this specialty.