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Altered Medical Records: What LNCs Need to Know
You receive 3,000 pages of hospital records for a medical malpractice case. You organize them, build a chronology, identify significant clinical events, and start comparing the documentation with the allegations. Everything seems to be there. But are you looking at the whole story? Or is one hidden in the records? With electronic health records, the…
Read MoreAcute Head Injury: What the Bedside Nurse Sees Before the Scan Confirms It
A nurse is doing a routine neuro check on a patient admitted after a fall with impact to her head six hours earlier. She sustained fractures of both arms. The head CT scan was within normal limits. The patient was oriented, moving all extremities, pupils equal and reactive. She complained of a mild headache and…
Read MoreWhy Postpartum Hemorrhage Cases Hinge on Timing: The Warning Signs Nobody Charted
Sarah had delivered a healthy baby girl four hours earlier. She was tired, a little shaky, and told the nurse she felt “off.” The nurse charted “patient resting comfortably” and moved to her next assignment. Ninety minutes later, Sarah’s blood pressure had dropped, her pad count told a story nobody had tallied, and her nurse…
Read MoreHigh-Risk Issues in Long-Term Care: What LNCs Should Look For
Long-term care cases can involve vulnerable residents, complicated medical histories, multiple caregivers, and thousands of pages of records. When allegations of abuse, neglect, or elopement arise, the legal nurse consultant has an important role in determining what happened, what the staff knew, and whether they recognized and addressed warning signs. Federal nursing home regulations give…
Read MoreAnalyzing a Bowel Emergency Case: Why the Timeline Can Make or Break the Case
The plaintiff attorney calls you to say she has a new case involving what she thinks is a delay in diagnosing a bowel emergency. Her client lost 9 feet of bowel. She wants you to evaluate the case for possible negligence. When you get the records, you note the patient complains of abdominal pain. The…
Read MoreDrug-Facilitated Sexual Assault: What Every LNC Should Know
A plaintiff attorney calls you with a case that doesn’t fit the usual pattern. The client remembers arriving at a party. She remembers one drink. Then nothing, until she woke up hours later, nude, in an unfamiliar bed. She does not recall a struggle or screaming, but she is lying next to a man she…
Read MorePediatric Airway Emergencies: What LNCs Should Look For
A pediatric airway emergency can become life-threatening within minutes. Children have smaller airways, higher oxygen demands, and less reserve than adults. A delay in recognizing respiratory distress, a missed change in assessment findings, or poor communication among healthcare providers can have devastating consequences. For attorneys handling these cases, the medical records tell the story of…
Read MoreParentheses – Powerful Punctuation
The LNC Who Lost a Job Opportunity Because of Punctuation Errors I know this because she lost a job with me. I looked at countless résumés when I had my own business. The moment I saw a typographical error, grammatical mistake, or punctuation error, I stopped reading. Do you think that’s unfair? Are you saying…
Read MoreMomentum: Your Greatest LNC Advantage—or Your Biggest Mistake
I just finished reading a novel about momentum, by John Grisham, called The Confession. An African American football player is accused of killing a white cheerleader in Texas, and he is wrongly convicted and sentenced to death. With less than a week to go before the execution date, the real killer approaches a minister and…
Read MoreHow to Add Captions to a Video
It seemed like a simple request. “Show me how to add captions to my video.” Two hours later, I was exasperated and chastising ChatGPT. What would turn a seasoned video editor and author into a raving woman? I sought the help of ChatGPT after a conversation with one of my coaching clients on how she…
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