Business card from DA’s office left in mailbox

[brabbit2222]

A Legal Process Officer from the county’s DA office left his business card in my mailbox, addressed to me, with his cell phone number on the back. It’s actually my old address, I moved a few months ago. Do I call them or just ignore this? What is this likely to be about? Am I getting sued?

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[bravotwozero]

more than likely it's some criminal case of a patient you've seen, that they want you to testify.

I'd ignore it. If it's what I mentioned, you'll get a subpoena notice/summons. Even if it's not, they'll find a way to get in touch with you sooner or later.

 

[ERMudPhud]

DA doesn't do medmal. Somebody got assaulted and you took care of them and they want you to testify. If you are feeling nice you could call them back and maybe even ask for expert witness pay, although criminal cases don't pay anything close to what medmal expert witness pays. If you don't want to be bothered ignore it. If they really need you they will find you eventually with a real subpoena

 

[thegenius]

Let them subpoena you properly, through proper protocols. I would ignore it until then.

 

[PikminOC]

DA doesn't do medmal. Somebody got assaulted and you took care of them and they want you to testify. If you are feeling nice you could call them back and maybe even ask for expert witness pay, although criminal cases don't pay anything close to what medmal expert witness pays. If you don't want to be bothered ignore it. If they really need you they will find you eventually with a real subpoena

How would he be an expert witness if he treated the patient? Then he's an unpaid fact witness

 

[Dr. Rude]

How would he be an expert witness if he treated the patient? Then he's an unpaid fact witness

If you happen to be a fact witness in something, e.g., you are walking down the street and come to the scene of an accident and see paramedics resuscitating somebody on the street, the plaintiff’s attorney gets a free pass on trying to depose you about the quality of their efforts i.e., ask expert witness type questions. This doesn’t mean that you have to be cooperative.

 

[Groove]

Just take a picture and send to your CMG or SDG lawyer and let them contact the DA and then tell you what to do. As others have said, it's most likely a criminal case. I got pulled into one of those while moonlighting as a resident over a child abuse case that was a pt of mine.

 

[BoardingDoc]

How would he be an expert witness if he treated the patient? Then he's an unpaid fact witness

If they want your opinion on anything from the case that isn't documented in your chart, you should be getting paid as an expert witness. They can subpoena you as a fact witness for sure, in which case you just read your chart out loud. If they want you to testify about literally anything else that isn't in your chart however, they need to pay you for your time. If they don't, it should play out like so:

Lawyer: It says there was bruising to the face. Did those bruises seem consistent with someone who had been hit with a bat?
You: My chart says there was ecchymosis to the cheek. I can't speculate as to the cause.
Lawyer: Did the patient appear intoxicated to you?
You: I did not document that.
Lawyer: But in your opinion, could they have been intoxicated?
You: I don't recall. My chart did not document that however.

etc etc etc.

Obviously, you can feel free to be as helpful as you want to be. I would argue though that if they're going to drag you into court that you should be paid for a missed day of work.

 

[Mount Asclepius]

Ignore. A business card isn’t a subpoena.

 

[ProReduction]

Ignore but keep your guard up. I had a DA try and illegitimately get me to testify in a murder case years ago. I had moved out of state and they were emailing me PDFs of a subpoena claiming I needed to fly to their state to testify in a case where I examined the patient one time in a single consult note confirming brain death. I contacted a lawyer in that state who said that an emailed PDF of a subpoena is not legal and that until they served it legally (via approval of a judge in my home state) that I was good. Eventually, the case went to trial. If I'd actually appeared I could have been stuck there for weeks without pay.

 

[PikminOC]

If they want your opinion on anything from the case that isn't documented in your chart, you should be getting paid as an expert witness. They can subpoena you as a fact witness for sure, in which case you just read your chart out loud. If they want you to testify about literally anything else that isn't in your chart however, they need to pay you for your time. If they don't, it should play out like so:

Lawyer: It says there was bruising to the face. Did those bruises seem consistent with someone who had been hit with a bat?
You: My chart says there was ecchymosis to the cheek. I can't speculate as to the cause.
Lawyer: Did the patient appear intoxicated to you?
You: I did not document that.
Lawyer: But in your opinion, could they have been intoxicated?
You: I don't recall. My chart did not document that however.

etc etc etc.

Obviously, you can feel free to be as helpful as you want to be. I would argue though that if they're going to drag you into court that you should be paid for a missed day of work.

Lawyers don't want to pay for that.

 

[thegenius]

If they want your opinion on anything from the case that isn't documented in your chart, you should be getting paid as an expert witness. They can subpoena you as a fact witness for sure, in which case you just read your chart out loud. If they want you to testify about literally anything else that isn't in your chart however, they need to pay you for your time. If they don't, it should play out like so:

Lawyer: It says there was bruising to the face. Did those bruises seem consistent with someone who had been hit with a bat?
You: My chart says there was ecchymosis to the cheek. I can't speculate as to the cause.
Lawyer: Did the patient appear intoxicated to you?
You: I did not document that.
Lawyer: But in your opinion, could they have been intoxicated?
You: I don't recall. My chart did not document that however.

etc etc etc.

Obviously, you can feel free to be as helpful as you want to be. I would argue though that if they're going to drag you into court that you should be paid for a missed day of work.

All of this is very reasonable and makes sense. Sometimes it's hard to get out of these things, and the DAs usually are accomodating to your schedule. Just remember though that they can call you in and ask anything they want.

I just had to do this earlier this year and the case was stayed over and over and over...but each time the DA was accomodating to my schedule. I didn't get paid. I tried to read off the chart. The problem is they want things in your own words. So you can try to be a real dick and say literally what's on the chart and if you write "there is a wound in the abd" they can ask you how deep was the wound, what did the wound look like, yada yada and you can say each time "I can only read off the chart". but they will say "We need you to say it in your own words" and then it just becomes a totally uncomfortable thing the entire time.

I generally contend that if they get you in court, you have already lost. If you can get money out of them, then good....but I don't really want to be an ass up there. Plus a lot of these criminal cases the charges are quite heinous and frankly they need to be locked up. I've testified for the prosecution on a domestic battery case where a womans face got smashed by her boyfriend punching her several times, and some meth head who killed his DAD! over meth.

You'll be talking to the DA several times before the case and that's when you should put your foot down on what you can say and not say. Make it very clear that you will be doing everything possible and that you can't give certain medical testimony.

It's hard like...if you document that the patient has hyperglycemia and the FSG is 320. What if they ask you "what does hyperglycemia mean?" I don't know if that is off limits.

 

[ScepticSkeksis]

Also ignore Jury summons. If you don't respond, you have plausible deniability to say you never got it.

 

[DocEspana]

I got a call from the local DA once about something similar. Hounded me for weeks to try to get me to cooperate. It wasn't even purposeful obstruction by me, I just kept asking to be told what it is about and saying I wouldn't come in to court in person to 'discuss the case' without being able to prepare and understand what is asked of me. They kept refusing to tell me stating they needed my cooperation and wouldn't say anything else except in person.

Finally they agreed to just tell me and said that I saw an assault patient during EMR downtime where I had a handwritten note in the record and they wanted me to write out my entire note for them to read, without concerns about legibility, for them to use as evidence. I asked if I could just... like.... email it to them from a work email. They said that was fine. That was all.

 

[Siggy]

Also ignore Jury summons. If you don't respond, you have plausible deniability to say you never got it.

So if you end up in front of a jury, you want the people who have nothing better to do or are too stupid to run from jury duty judging you?

 

[thegenius]

So if you end up in front of a jury, you want the people who have nothing better to do or are too stupid to run from jury duty judging you?

So much goes into picking a jury that this really is the least of your problems. Nobody wants to be there.

A lawyer friend has ignored jury summons his entire life and nothing has ever happened to him, so he says.

 

[ERMudPhud]

How would he be an expert witness if he treated the patient? Then he's an unpaid fact witness

Every county where I've ever been subpoenaed in Colorado has had a system in place to pay doctor's and the like for their time. In fact they had a folder full of blank forms on the check in desk at the witness office. Just fill out a one page form with your name, address, and ssn and get a check in the mail a few weeks later and a 1099 at the end of the year. They would much rather have you agreeing to show up when they ask and answer all their questions. They were usually willing to work around my schedule and as some one pointed out a lot of the people on trial were very bad people who did horrible life altering things to other people so I didn't mind too much. Last I checked the non-negotiable rate was $150/hr for prep, travel, waiting, and testifying time. I could usually justify 4 hours minimum. So, like I said not Medmal money but your soul is intact. Only problem is some of the cases ended up pleading out or the defendant or victims were no shows and the case never went to trial so I would have set aside my day for nothing. I was never mercenary enough to try to bill for the canceled trials. Haven't been contacted for one of these since before COVID though so my info is probably a bit out of date

 

[Birdstrike]

A Legal Process Officer from the county’s DA office left his business card in my mailbox, addressed to me, with his cell phone number on the back. It’s actually my old address, I moved a few months ago. Do I call them or just ignore this? What is this likely to be about? Am I getting sued?

Anything important comes by hand, in the form of a legal subpoena, from a process server. If it’s only a business card, and they didn’t care enough to do a little bit of legwork to actually track you down, I can’t imagine it’s too important. If it is, they’ll find you and serve you legally, you can be sure of that.

 

[ScepticSkeksis]

So if you end up in front of a jury, you want the people who have nothing better to do or are too stupid to run from jury duty judging you?

Unfortunately that's our current jury system. Very few people want to lose money from not working to go sit in court for multiple days. Would I really want to lose $3000-$10000 to go do jury duty? That leaves the unemployed, and those with too much time on their hands. In an ideal world we would compensate people for jury duty with their average hourly pay.

 

[BoardingDoc]

"We need you to say it in your own words"

These are my words. I wrote them.

If they continue to prod I would simply state that: Asking me to paraphrase my own writing only introduces the possibility that I will inadvertantly fill in any mental gaps with logical but not necessarily perfectly factual statements. I'd rather not poison your case and simultaneously perjure myself if that's alright.

I would make it very clear pre-trial that this was my position.

 

[Jball43]

Good discussion here. I’m a Criminal prosecutor, but I’d like to get some academic input that is totally not legal advice of any kind. I’m assuming you’re not asked to be an expert and are just a witness.

A DA (district attorney) is a prosecutor who usually handles felonies.

An official subpoena will not be ambiguous and criminal witness subpoenas are typically delivered by law enforcement officers, court officials, or authorized process servers. There are complex service of process laws that dictate interstate policy, so like another poster on this thread, you should notify your attorney about this. Especially since there could be a real one coming. They will explain whether to answer or not. A lot of us know each other personally and he may be able to shed light on this behavior.

Sometimes we like to do some fact finding before deciding to indict and reach out personally to knowledgeable witnesses to see if it’s worth it. I am from a small county and things are done informally a lot like this. But since it’s a criminal case, you don’t usually get money because a crime allegedly happened, no money is changing hands for either side. You can get paid for civil trials though.

However, please remember subpoenas are court-issued orders compelling individuals to testify or produce documents as witnesses. Failure to obey a subpoena could result in being held in contempt of court, which can lead to fines or even imprisonment. (This is up to the judge)

Ignoring a jury summons is also something that can get you held in contempt of court. Although it’s not usually a *crime* most judges don’t care enough to punish you for it.

Most doctors I cross-examine are on zoom if that helps.

Remember each state is different. The DA is drafting you to their team, like it or not, and the defense attorney will be more than a little annoying, so might as well not have two lawyers upset at you. Also, it’s never a bad idea to be nice to a DA, maybe they can get your football star son out of a ticket one day.

*always consult an attorney before asking randos on the internet*

Post edit notes: The state already has agreements with physicians to work as experts so it would be highly unusual just to hire an additional expert witness for one case. The office of a DA is run by state funds and we don’t have the power to actually hire people. At least in my state. So that’s why I am expecting you to be a fact witness. I hope that’s useful to some degree.

 

[BulgeDaTwine]

Good discussion here. I’m a Criminal prosecutor, but I’d like to get some academic input that is totally not legal advice of any kind. I’m assuming you’re not asked to be an expert and are just a witness.

A DA (district attorney) is a prosecutor who usually handles felonies.

An official subpoena will not be ambiguous and criminal witness subpoenas are typically delivered by law enforcement officers, court officials, or authorized process servers. There are complex service of process laws that dictate interstate policy, so like another poster on this thread, you should notify your attorney about this. Especially since there could be a real one coming. They will explain whether to answer or not. A lot of us know each other personally and he may be able to shed light on this behavior.

Sometimes we like to do some fact finding before deciding to indict and reach out personally to knowledgeable witnesses to see if it’s worth it. I am from a small county and things are done informally a lot like this. But since it’s a criminal case, you don’t usually get money because a crime allegedly happened, no money is changing hands for either side. You can get paid for civil trials though.

However, please remember subpoenas are court-issued orders compelling individuals to testify or produce documents as witnesses. Failure to obey a subpoena could result in being held in contempt of court, which can lead to fines or even imprisonment. (This is up to the judge)

Ignoring a jury summons is also something that can get you held in contempt of court. Although it’s not usually a *crime* most judges don’t care enough to punish you for it.

Most doctors I cross-examine are on zoom if that helps.

Remember each state is different. The DA is drafting you to their team, like it or not, and the defense attorney will be more than a little annoying, so might as well not have two lawyers upset at you. Also, it’s never a bad idea to be nice to a DA, maybe they can get your football star son out of a ticket one day.

*always consult an attorney before asking randos on the internet*

Post edit notes: The state already has agreements with physicians to work as experts so it would be highly unusual just to hire an additional expert witness for one case. The office of a DA is run by state funds and we don’t have the power to actually hire people. At least in my state. So that’s why I am expecting you to be a fact witness. I hope that’s useful to some degree.

Dear lawyer: Redacted my reference and you’re right, we should embrace your presence (sincerely).

I’ve been asked to attend court so many times with veiled threats to show up or else. Like other posters said, there is only one way to handle this: respond only to true subpoenas as required by law, otherwise you’re being played (read: tricked, intimidated, threatened) into a free/budget price expert witness.

To the guy who thought it reasonable (in Colorado I think) to fill out the form and get $150/hr - you must be a USUCkS doc in Denver because my time is worth more than $150/hr to buttress some lazy court jockeys who can’t or won’t pay properly for expert witnesses. Given that typical soul sucking lawyers charge minimum $450/hr (I realize a public DA does not make this) my soul is intact just fine not acquiescing to the cheap tricks of these lawyers. Any DA worth their salt will make their case without relying on the poor schmuck MD showing up to comment on their charting so you needn’t feel guilty that you aren’t helping society be better by punishing the real criminals.

 

[thegenius]

Wow such a pleasant thread until this last post.

 

[ERMudPhud]

Dear lawyer: Maybe studentlawyernetwork is a thing. Go back there.



To the guy who thought it reasonable (in Colorado I think) to fill out the form and get $150/hr - you must be a USUCkS doc in Denver because my time is worth more than $150/hr to buttress some lazy court jockeys who can’t or won’t pay properly for expert witnesses.

Wow, so someone who at least sounds like they have some expertise outside the usual scope of this group offers a reasonable and well thought out response and you have to be a d!ck about it.

Also, you weren't reading very carefully. First thing I said was

If you are feeling nice you could call them back and maybe even ask for expert witness pay, although criminal cases don't pay anything close to what medmal expert witness pays. If you don't want to be bothered ignore it. If they really need you they will find you eventually with a real subpoena

I always found getting paid $600 for 20 minutes of testimony was pretty easy work. A lot easier than getting assaulted and threatened while seeing 3 patients/hr in my regular job. 35 minutes reviewing my notes and the case(1 billable hour), 40 minutes round trip drive time(1 billable hour), 35 minutes waiting to testify(1 billable hour), 20 minutes testifying(1 billable hour). As I said you can always ignore them until you get a real subpoena. Most of the time they go away but if I'm going to have to go to court anyway might as well work with the DA and get enough money for some new backcountry gear.

 

[JacobMcCandles]

I don't see what the harm is in having a discussion with the DA in this instance. It could easily prevent them from unnecessarily wasting your time in the future.

 

[WorkNoteEmergency]

If just a business card, I would probably ignore. If it was accompanied with a note saying what was needed from me or even just asking to contact, I'd give a call.

I have been subpoenaed 3 times for criminal/civil cases:

#1 - In residency a drunk patient took a swing at me, missed, walked out of ER, assaulted someone else. The DA got in touch with me, told me what would happen and what was needed from me. It went very smoothly.

#2 - Again in residency subpoenaed for a case in a town 1 hr drive away. Left VM with the DA office asking what was needed from me. Never called me back. I looked up the name of the case in the EMR and pulled up the chart from the only time I saw that person as a patient. Drove to the court that day, asked around, nobody knew anything, sat in the gallery for half hour or so. Eventually, the judge said some mumbo jumbo with my case name in the middle of it and it became apparent to me that the court was moving on to something else. I left and drove the hour back home. Never heard anything else about it.

#3 - Same deal a few years ago as an attending. No response to my request for info. I traded shifts, put on my nice clothes, drove downtown checked in and was told the case was settled out of court.

I'm not at the level of Dr Angryman above but it is pretty ****ty to compel someone to come to court like that and then treat them with such disregard. So with that background I'm not very interested in going above and beyond for the court system.

 

[Boatswain2PA]

I'm not at the level of Dr Angryman above but it is pretty ****ty to compel someone to come to court like that and then treat them with such disregard. So with that background I'm not very interested in going above and beyond for the court system.

Exactly. The cops and attorneys all laugh about going to court, because they are getting PAID to be there. No big deal to them if the case gets continued multiple times because it's just more overtime or billing hours.

 

[Tenk]

I think it’s complete bs we aren’t paid to show up to this criminal or dhs crap. Literally every single other person working on that case is getting paid except us. Then they try to get you to give expert testimony for free.

I was recently subpeonaed for one. Told to show up at like 11 am. I show up and am waiting outside the court room. Finally go find someone because it was locked and they tell me they settled in the morning. Nobody even bothered to fing call me. Messed up my whole day for nothing. AHHHH RAGE!!!

 

[RustedFox]

Just got a subpoena today for some case that I saw who knows how long ago.
I'm prepared to tell them that if they can read what I wrote, then that's all they get; as I have zero recollection of the case.
It's true.

 

[CoolDoc1729]

I think it’s complete bs we aren’t paid to show up to this criminal or dhs crap. Literally every single other person working on that case is getting paid except us. Then they try to get you to give expert testimony for free.

I was recently subpeonaed for one. Told to show up at like 11 am. I show up and am waiting outside the court room. Finally go find someone because it was locked and they tell me they settled in the morning. Nobody even bothered to fing call me. Messed up my whole day for nothing. AHHHH RAGE!!!

When I was about 1.5 years out I had a similar situation, except I called about 12 times and left messages explaining that I had a newborn and was there any way they could do the case without me. I never got an answer, so I packed up my husband and my 3 week old, paid for parking and dragged everyone through the metal detectors. After milling around outside the courtroom for about 90 minutes the DA came out between cases, saw me, made the connection and said oh, didn’t “they” call you? I told them to call you and tell you we didn’t need you to come

🤦🏻‍♀️

 

[ScepticSkeksis]

As the DA above said, why can't these all be Zoom calls? The drive-time, parking, metal detectors, then waiting in court are what really sucks up the time. They should just say "Hey be available during these times at home and we will Zoom you".

 

[Apollyon]

As the DA above said, why can't these all be Zoom calls? The drive-time, parking, metal detectors, then waiting in court are what really sucks up the time. They should just say "Hey be available during these times at home and we will Zoom you".

Not for nothing, but, your last sentence brought me back to the 80s...

 

[Birdstrike]

Dear lawyer: Maybe studentlawyernetwork is a thing. Go back there.

For the record, I personally like it when someone knowledgeable outside of medicine (or Emergency Medicine, specifically) comes to this forum to add to what is usually a boring, echo chamber. So, as far as I'm concerned, @Jball43 is welcome here, as well as anyone else willing to respectfully contribute to the conversation, which they did.

 

[RustedFox]

Dear lawyer: Maybe studentlawyernetwork is a thing. Go back there.

I’ve been asked to do crap for your ilk so many times with veiled threats to show up or else. Like other posters said, there is only one way to handle this: respond only to true subpoenas as required by law, otherwise you’re being played (read: tricked, intimidated, threatened) into a free/budget price expert witness.

To the guy who thought it reasonable (in Colorado I think) to fill out the form and get $150/hr - you must be a USUCkS doc in Denver because my time is worth more than $150/hr to buttress some lazy court jockeys who can’t or won’t pay properly for expert witnesses. Given that typical soul sucking lawyers charge minimum $450/hr (I realize a public DA does not make this) my soul is intact just fine not acquiescing to the cheap tricks of these lawyers. Any DA worth their salt will make their case without relying on the poor schmuck MD showing up to comment on their charting so you needn’t feel guilty that you aren’t helping society be better by punishing the real criminals.

Bro. He's cool.

 

[BulgeDaTwine]

For the record, I personally like it when someone knowledgeable outside of medicine (or Emergency Medicine, specifically) comes to this forum to add to what is usually a boring, echo chamber. So, as far as I'm concerned, @Jball43 is welcome here, as well as anyone else willing to respectfully contribute to the conversation, which they did.

Fair. I will edit and retract that part.

The issue I have is that DAs are not transparent and professionally collegial with their requests and it is compounded by physicians not understanding the dynamics at work and naively emboldening the attorneys to continue the behavior.

-the only obligation to go to court as a non expert is via subpoena.
-letters signed by district attorneys are not subpoenas, even though they appear so and DAs routinely refer to them as same. Subpoenas are signed by a judge.
-these “requests” have evolved due to court budgetary constraints. DAs learned that without the funds to pay for an expert witness, they could subpoena the ER doc of record and twist the questioning to reveal expert conjecture, essentially uncompensated (or at a rate that pales in comparison to market rates for expert witnesses and less than the law profession charges for their hourly consultation).
-if you call the DA to discuss and offer to appear under the auspices of a paid expert witness, most DAs will first lie and say you are required to attend (not true if not a subpoena), then engage in at least a weak attempt to threaten and intimidate you by telling you that you’re wrong.
-In a non subpoena situation when you engage the attorney by phone or email, when you remind them that if they do subpoena you, you will dutifully show up read and refer to the EMR and the EMR only, the subpoena never comes because one was never coming in the first place.

One may take this information as you see fit. Sorry I ruffled some of your feathers, folks, but being the mark of other professions hurts us all… and it didn’t work out so well in the case of private equity, so hopefully this response was a littler gentler for your sensibilities.

 

[BulgeDaTwine]

Wow, so someone who at least sounds like they have some expertise outside the usual scope of this group offers a reasonable and well thought out response and you have to be a d!ck about it.

Also, you weren't reading very carefully. First thing I said was


I always found getting paid $600 for 20 minutes of testimony was pretty easy work. A lot easier than getting assaulted and threatened while seeing 3 patients/hr in my regular job. 35 minutes reviewing my notes and the case(1 billable hour), 40 minutes round trip drive time(1 billable hour), 35 minutes waiting to testify(1 billable hour), 20 minutes testifying(1 billable hour). As I said you can always ignore them until you get a real subpoena. Most of the time they go away but if I'm going to have to go to court anyway might as well work with the DA and get enough money for some new backcountry gear.

I mean, if that’s how you compute value, I feel ya. Me, it’s a dollar based compensation divided by all the time invested and I think all the activities (some of which you mentioned): chart review, travel time, waiting around, potentially not getting called, phone and email time before during and after…. really add up to more than your estimates. These are things lawyers would charge you for, by the way.

Comparing it to the relative inconvenience of your own job and patient behavior… while most here would understand that, I’m not sure it’s an apples to apples comparison. By that logic, seems like any other employment might be ultimately preferable.

 

[Tenk]

Fair. I will edit and retract that part.

The issue I have is that DAs are not transparent and professionally collegial with their requests and it is compounded by physicians not understanding the dynamics at work and naively emboldening the attorneys to continue the behavior.

-the only obligation to go to court as a non expert is via subpoena.
-letters signed by district attorneys are not subpoenas, even though they appear so and DAs routinely refer to them as same. Subpoenas are signed by a judge.
-these “requests” have evolved due to court budgetary constraints. DAs learned that without the funds to pay for an expert witness, they could subpoena the ER doc of record and twist the questioning to reveal expert conjecture, essentially uncompensated (or at a rate that pales in comparison to market rates for expert witnesses and less than the law profession charges for their hourly consultation).
-if you call the DA to discuss and offer to appear under the auspices of a paid expert witness, most DAs will first lie and say you are required to attend (not true if not a subpoena), then engage in at least a weak attempt to threaten and intimidate you by telling you that you’re wrong.
-In a non subpoena situation when you engage the attorney by phone or email, when you remind them that if they do subpoena you, you will dutifully show up read and refer to the EMR and the EMR only, the subpoena never comes because one was never coming in the first place.

One may take this information as you see fit. Sorry I ruffled some of your feathers, folks, but being the mark of other professions hurts us all… and it didn’t work out so well in the case of private equity, so hopefully this response was a littler gentler for your sensibilities.

Good knowledge. I didn’t even check who signed the subpoena. Will do from now on. Thanks.

 

[RustedFox]

Remember when we used to post all kinds of academic stuff on here?
And even community stuff that was pretty damn cool?
We don't do that anymore.
It's because we're all burned out AF.
EM wasn't this way 10 years ago when I was fresh out.

Too much money ruins things.
I watched in the 80s as it ruined sports.
I watched in the 90s as it ruined politics.
I watched in the 00s as it ruined music.
I watched in the 10s as it ruined EM.

 

[BulgeDaTwine]

Remember when we used to post all kinds of academic stuff on here?
And even community stuff that was pretty damn cool?
We don't do that anymore.
It's because we're all burned out AF.
EM wasn't this way 10 years ago when I was fresh out.

Too much money ruins things.
I watched in the 80s as it ruined sports.
I watched in the 90s as it ruined politics.
I watched in the 00s as it ruined music.
I watched in the 10s as it ruined EM.

Is this your Jerry McGuire speech? Maybe you mean too much money STOLEN.

We didn’t get richer (except a few) by private equity taking over our practices, government-enabled midlevels devaluing our expertise (and reducing jobs in the pool), administration exploding and usurping our say in how the practice is run, insurance demand we play their documentation game and spend an inordinate amount of time on transfers when our hospitals are capable of care, need I go on?

We are burned out AF , yes.

But it’s not about OUR money - it’s about power and cost containment.

 

[thegenius]

Remember when we used to post all kinds of academic stuff on here?
And even community stuff that was pretty damn cool?
We don't do that anymore.
It's because we're all burned out AF.
EM wasn't this way 10 years ago when I was fresh out.

Too much money ruins things.
I watched in the 80s as it ruined sports.
I watched in the 90s as it ruined politics.
I watched in the 00s as it ruined music.
I watched in the 10s as it ruined EM.

the interesting stuff these days isn't even worth posting here.
I had an old lady who had blood cultures + Brucella.
It's, like, interesting because I haven't seen that since medical school. I forgot everything about brucella that one had to know.
still cool though.

 

[RustedFox]

Is this your Jerry McGuire speech? Maybe you mean too much money STOLEN.

We didn’t get richer (except a few) by private equity taking over our practices, government-enabled midlevels devaluing our expertise (and reducing jobs in the pool), administration exploding and usurping our say in how the practice is run, insurance demand we play their documentation game and spend an inordinate amount of time on transfers when our hospitals are capable of care, need I go on?

We are burned out AF , yes.

But it’s not about OUR money - it’s about power and cost containment.

I never saw Jerry McGuire - so you're going to have to explain it to me.

 

[BoardingDoc]

I never saw Jerry McGuire - so you're going to have to explain it to me.

Something something something show me the money something something something you had me at hello.

I've also never seen it, but I feel like this is an adequate understanding of the film.

 

[Apollyon]

the interesting stuff these days isn't even worth posting here.
I had an old lady who had blood cultures + Brucella.
It's, like, interesting because I haven't seen that since medical school. I forgot everything about brucella that one had to know.
still cool though.

Back in my day, there were 4 species of Brucella taught as human pathogens. Now these newfangled kids have 6!

 

[southerndoc]

Just got a subpoena today for some case that I saw who knows how long ago.
I'm prepared to tell them that if they can read what I wrote, then that's all they get; as I have zero recollection of the case.
It's true.

Unfortunately, records cannot be presented in court without the author reading it due to questions regarding intent. This is why we get subpoenas just to testify as a medical witness. They realize under most circumstances that we don't remember a patient's exam/story 5 years later.

 

[southerndoc]

Fair. I will edit and retract that part.

The issue I have is that DAs are not transparent and professionally collegial with their requests and it is compounded by physicians not understanding the dynamics at work and naively emboldening the attorneys to continue the behavior.

-the only obligation to go to court as a non expert is via subpoena.
-letters signed by district attorneys are not subpoenas, even though they appear so and DAs routinely refer to them as same. Subpoenas are signed by a judge.
-these “requests” have evolved due to court budgetary constraints. DAs learned that without the funds to pay for an expert witness, they could subpoena the ER doc of record and twist the questioning to reveal expert conjecture, essentially uncompensated (or at a rate that pales in comparison to market rates for expert witnesses and less than the law profession charges for their hourly consultation).
-if you call the DA to discuss and offer to appear under the auspices of a paid expert witness, most DAs will first lie and say you are required to attend (not true if not a subpoena), then engage in at least a weak attempt to threaten and intimidate you by telling you that you’re wrong.
-In a non subpoena situation when you engage the attorney by phone or email, when you remind them that if they do subpoena you, you will dutifully show up read and refer to the EMR and the EMR only, the subpoena never comes because one was never coming in the first place.

One may take this information as you see fit. Sorry I ruffled some of your feathers, folks, but being the mark of other professions hurts us all… and it didn’t work out so well in the case of private equity, so hopefully this response was a littler gentler for your sensibilities.

I usually talk to them. In return, I'm allowed to be on call for cases (not just the one they're questioning). Piss off the DA or solicitor, and you could spend all week at the courthouse waiting on your turn to testify (or just be let go). Nothing prevents them from not allowing a physician to be on call. Quite frankly, it would be costly to most of us if we lost a week's worth of income sitting in the courthouse waiting to be called to the stand.

Having said that, I don't offer free expert witness testimony. I'm more than happy to discuss the facts.