Your patient or injured worker has reached MMI and is ready for their final impairment rating: it’s time to complete the California PR-4 Report.
What goes into these reports, which are required for each reported work comp injury in California? A summary of how the injury occurred, attempted treatments to date, how the patient is doing currently, future care and medications… to name a few items.
But perhaps most important to the PR-4 report is a detailed set of measurements which create a value for the injury (Whole Person Impairment or WPI%). These measurements are required by the AMA guides to be reproducible, and determine if the employee is eligible for a payment benefit based on permanent impairment findings.
We recommend using RateFast for fully reproducible findings on PR-4 reports. RateFast provides a digitized patient exam for correct prioritization of all data. But, whenever you’re performing a PR-4 report, keep these tips in mind:
- For multiple body part claims remember to keep all injuries in mind when providing treatment.
- Create a consistent system for collecting information for all patients.
- Remember incorrect measurements lead to incorrect impairment ratings. Always measure twice for accuracy.