RateFast Express is an even easier alternative to the wonderful RateFast software. Try RateFast Express today!
This article is for RateFast users who want to change the address, phone number, fax number, office locations, and billing information in their RateFast account. Last updated on July 25th, 2023.
Update for 2021: RateFast Express is an even easier alternative to the wonderful RateFast software. Try RateFast Express today!
This article is for RateFast users who want to save a completed report from RateFast to their computer. Last updated on July 5th, 2016.
After you finish your RateFast report, you may want to save it to your computer so that you can easily access, print, or fax it. You can quickly access and download a particular report in RateFast by following the steps below.
Continue reading How to Download a RateFast Report in 5 Easy Steps (with images)
Whether you’re a medical provider, an injured worker, a claims adjuster, or an attorney, this article is relevant to you if you’ve encountered a 0% whole person impairment rating in a California PR-4 or QME report.
If you receive a report—or are writing a report—with 0% WPI (whole person impairment), this number should raise some flags.
Why?
Because, when it comes to the AMA Guides and impairment rating, a 0% WPI is a very special number.
If a report claims that a patient has 0% impairment, then it needs to meet some specific requirements. If it doesn’t meet those requirements, then the number is inaccurate—and as we all know, an inaccurate impairment rating can lead to unnecessary delay, litigation, and expense for all stakeholders.
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This is article is meant for injured workers’, medical providers, qualified medical examiners (QMEs), insurance adjusters, and other stakeholders in a California workers’ compensation claim.
When a medical condition has reached Maximal Medical Improvement (MMI), the QME (Qualified Medical Examiner) is required to perform an impairment rating exam.
The impairment exam consists of a series of detailed questions and measurements defined by California law and the American Medical Association (AMA) Guides, 5th Edition.
An accurate and correct impairment exam leads to faster settlement and delivery of benefits, whereas an incorrect exam leads to delay, confusion, and or costly litigation.
As a stakeholder in the system, here are three simple questions you should ask in order to determine the accuracy of your orthopedic medical exam.
Continue reading 3 Critical Questions to Ask About your Qualified Medical Exam
An orthopedic injury is an injury affecting the spine, upper or lower extremity. It may be an injury that affects joint motion, muscle strength, or nerve function (sensory pain, or strength).
Check out the transcription of our podcast, where we interviewed Dr. Athanassious about what an orthopedic injury might mean for a doctor and a patient.
Not so long ago, a certain patient with a work-related injury was sent to a state Qualified Medical Examiner (QME) by the insurance carrier. The QME gave the patient a 0% whole person impairment rating. The QME charged the medical-legal fee schedule, which is approximately twice the primary treating fee schedule.
Then, the patient’s primary treating physician (PTP) performed an impairment rating exam using RateFast. Guided by the RateFast app, the physician obtained a complete history and measurement set. Four body parts were evaluated: neck, right shoulder, right elbow, and right wrist. After the exam and measurements were analyzed by RateFast, it was determined that the patient had a 17% whole person impairment—compared to the 0% WPI assigned by the QME.
The insurance company was understandably confused. The patient couldn’t have both a 0% and a 17% impairment rating. So which rating was correct? The rating that was calculated by the qualified medical examiner? Or the number produced by the treating physician?
In search of answers, the insurance company showed the RateFast report to the QME and asked for a review. The QME responded that he had not actually performed any of the required exams, or measured the range of motion for the injured body parts. After reviewing the RateFast report, the QME advised that the insurance carrier discard his own 0% rating, and instead adopt the 17% impairment rating from RateFast.
The RateFast report was then shot like a pebble from a sling into the heart of the the California state disability evaluation unit (DEU).
The RateFast report was accepted by the DEU, and the case prepared for settlement.
A qualified medical examiner’s process is not necessarily any more accurate than reports created by primary treating physicians. The main factor that separates good reports from bad reports—and excellent reports from good reports—is the tool used to document, collect, and analyze data from the patient’s examination.
When the QME and the stakeholders were confronted with overwhelming documentation and actual measurements supporting the findings, there was a little else to do but accept the RateFast report as correct—for the benefit of all. Correct reports that deliver the right value the first time serve all stakeholders—the injured worker, the insurance carrier, and the employer. Incorrect reporting invites frustration, litigation, delay, and skyrocketing costs.
RateFast invites you to get on the right side of impairment rating—while at the same time increasing efficiency and profitability in your medical clinic. You can contact us for a demonstration.
Update for 2021: RateFast Express is an even easier alternative to the wonderful RateFast software. Try RateFast Express today!
This post is intended for RateFast users who want to invite other users to join their RateFast practice account. Last updated on April 26th, 2016.
Inviting other members of your clinic or organization to join your RateFast practice account is easy, as described in this article about how to invite new users.
But what can you do if you’ve sent an invitation to somebody and they never got the email? Or they got the email but lost it?
Fear not: there’s an easy solution.
1. Login to your RateFast account.
2. Click your name in the upper right corner.
3. Click the “Users” link.
4. Search for the exact email address of the person whom you have previously invited. (Their “Status” should display as “Invited”.)
5. Click the orange “Resend invitation” button.
6. Your colleague should receive another invitation email!
Update for 2021: RateFast Express is an even easier alternative to the wonderful RateFast software. Try RateFast Express today!
This post is intended for RateFast users who want to invite other users to join their RateFast practice. Last updated on June 24th, 2022.
If you’ve just joined RateFast, then you may want other members of your staff to join your practice to help collaborate on writing and tracking workers’ compensation reports.
In order to bring your colleagues into your RateFast account, you need to invite them as new users. Here’s how it works:
To learn more about roles and permissions, check out our blog post about the different user levels.
4. If you want to invite multiple people, click the “Add Another” button.
5. To send the invitation, click the “Send” button.
This will send an email to your colleague inviting them to sign up for Ratefast. The email will contain a link. Ask your colleague to click the link, choose their username, password, and then login to the organization account.
If they already have a RateFast user account associated with the email you invited, then they will receive an email inviting them to login to your organization account using their normal username. In this case, there is no need to choose a new username/password.
6. Confirm that the email is received.
It may appear to your colleague that the invitation email hasn’t been received. There are two common reasons why this happens:
This article is for medical providers, insurance adjusters, and attorneys who want to better understand the process of a Sub Rosa within the context of a workers’ compensation case.
Sub Rosa is a fancy latin term that literally means “Under the Rose.” In workers’ compensation, however, it means secret investigation—surveillance. During a Sub Rosa investigation, usually an investigator is sent out to survey the injured worker. The investigator attempts to observe what level of physical activity the injured worker can or cannot perform. The second, and less common use of Sub Rosa in work comp is to investigate a doctor, an employer, work sites, and/or working conditions.
When insurance adjusters, employers, or medical providers require a Sub Rosa investigation, they are normally looking evidence that an employee can perform observable physical activities that are in excess of what they claim they can do.
For instance, an injured worker may report that they can’t lift anything, or can’t bend over, or can’t walk without a cane. The fundamental purpose of this surveillance is to verify or disprove the validity of what the person is claiming in regards to their physical or psychological conditions.
Sometimes a patient may claim that they have good days and bad days. In these cases, their limitations ambiguous. It’s very important, therefore, that Sub Rosas span several, separate days, to provide an accurate view of the patient’s conditions.
Most surveillance tapes are dead-boring. It is advisable for the doctor to dictate what she observes the patient doing while she watches the tape. It’s also important for the doctor to state whether she can clearly identify that the person being filmed is the patient in question, or whether she knows it is certainly not the patient, or whether she can’t tell.
An attorney may consider a Sub Rosa to be useful if one or more of the following are present:
Yes. There is a lot that can be gained from a frank discussion with the patient about their symptoms and physical findings. Here at RateFast, we are committed to remaining non-partisan—we believe the ultimate goal of a workers’ compensation claim should be to get patients safely back to work. Therefore, we recommend an open and honest discussion with the injured worker before considering surveillance.
Update for 2021: RateFast Express is an even easier alternative to the wonderful RateFast software. Try RateFast Express today!
RateFast’s ability to calculate impairment ratings is probably the best way to save time when writing PR-4 reports and closing a work injury claim. Check out the quickstart graphic below, or view the image directly.
