Pascagoula Longshore IME Lawyer

The insurance carrier handling your Pascagoula longshore claim will send you to a doctor they chose, paid for, and have used dozens of times before in federal LHWCA hearings. They call it an independent medical examination. There is nothing independent about it. The physician performing that examination has a professional relationship with the carrier that is built on years of referrals. His opinions on disability ratings, causation, and return to work consistently favor the carrier. That is not an accident. That is how he keeps getting hired. The TV lawyer who has never been in a federal longshore hearing does not know who that doctor is, does not know his history on the stand, and does not know how to fight the opinion he is about to produce. I do.

What The Carrier IME Is Actually Designed To Produce

The independent medical examination in an LHWCA claim is a formal examination conducted by a physician retained by the carrier for the purpose of generating a medical opinion that serves the carrier’s litigation position. The physician will review your medical records, conduct a physical examination, and produce a written report. That report will address three things the carrier cares about: whether your condition is causally related to the work injury, what your impairment rating is, and whether you have reached maximum medical improvement and are capable of returning to work.

On causation, the carrier IME physician will look for any prior medical history that can be used to argue pre-existing condition. Any prior back complaint, any prior shoulder treatment, any history of the same body part being symptomatic before the work injury — all of that will appear in the IME report as support for the argument that the work did not cause the condition or that the work merely aggravated a pre-existing problem rather than causing a new one. Under the LHWCA, aggravation of a pre-existing condition is still compensable, but the carrier will frame the pre-existing condition argument in its most aggressive form to minimize the claim’s value.

On impairment rating, the IME physician will use the AMA Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment and make every discretionary judgment call in the direction that produces the lowest rating the methodology can support. The difference between a 15 percent and a 25 percent impairment rating to the arm, applied to the Mississippi longshore permanent disability schedule, is the difference between 47 weeks and 78 weeks of compensation at two-thirds of your wage rate. At Ingalls wages, that gap is substantial. The carrier knows exactly what that gap is worth in dollars and they have calibrated the IME to close it in their favor.

On maximum medical improvement and return to work, the IME physician will find that you have reached MMI earlier than your treating physician would, with less residual restriction, and at a functional level that permits return to some form of work sooner than your actual condition warrants. That opinion directly reduces the wage replacement period and supports the carrier’s argument for a lower settlement value.

Your Rights When The Carrier Sends You To An IME

You have the right to have your own representative present at the IME under LHWCA regulations. You have the right to record the examination. You have the right to review the IME report and respond to it with your own medical evidence. Most importantly, you have the right to your own treating physician whose opinion can be presented at hearing alongside or against the carrier’s IME opinion.

The Administrative Law Judge who hears your case will weigh the credibility of the IME physician against the credibility of your treating physician. A judge who has seen the same carrier IME physician testify in twenty prior cases knows what that physician always says. A lawyer who has cross-examined that physician before knows which questions expose the pattern of carrier-favorable opinions and undermine the physician’s credibility with the judge. The TV lawyer has never cross-examined anyone in a federal LHWCA hearing. That ignorance shows at the hearing level, and the carrier knows it before the hearing date is set.

The right to choose your own treating physician — separate from the IME — is one of the most important strategic decisions in your claim. How to assert that right correctly, and what to look for in a treating physician whose documentation will hold up in a federal hearing, is covered in detail on the choose your own doctor under the Longshore Act Mississippi page.

How To Respond To A Carrier IME That Minimizes Your Ingalls Injury

When the carrier’s IME report arrives and it says what carrier IME reports always say — minimal impairment, pre-existing condition, maximum medical improvement reached, return to full duty — the response is not to accept it. The response is to build the counter-record with your own medical evidence.

That means ensuring your treating physician has documented the full extent of your impairment using objective findings and standardized methodology. It means obtaining a functional capacity evaluation that objectively measures what you can and cannot do. It means having your treating physician address the IME physician’s causation opinion specifically and explain why the work injury, not a pre-existing condition, is responsible for your current functional limitations. And it means having a Pascagoula longshore lawyer who knows how to take that counter-record into a federal hearing and use it to expose the IME physician’s opinion for what it is.

Before you attend any carrier IME, and before you give the adjuster a recorded statement, get the free book at the bottom of this page. It covers the carrier’s full playbook from the first call through the settlement offer and what you need to protect at every step.

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