A Partner at Boxer & Gerson LLP, Julius Young has practiced worker’s compensation law and social security disability law since 1979. He has represented thousands of individuals who have sustained life-changing injuries or illnesses while on the job. In every case, his goal is to secure the medical treatments his clients need.
At midyear, it’s time to assess the top developments in California workers’ comp during the first half of 2021. Separating the signal from the noise is not always easy. But here is my assessment of the important developments and trends, in the California system, in no particular order: 1. WCAB Commissioner Juan Pedro Gaffney has […]
A California Division of Workers’ Compensation public comment forum regarding proposed amendments to QME regulations recently closed. Amendments proposed by the DWC would make changes in the eligibility requirements for initial QME appointments and in the criteria for reappointment, alter some QME education requirements, and tweak some provisions on denial of QME reappointment or appointment. […]
The concept of a statewide MPN (Medical Provider Network) is dead for the foreseeable future. The California Medical Provider Network (CAMPN) was originally proposed under Assembly Bill 1465, sponsored by California Assembly members Eloise Reyes and Lorena Gonzalez. The proposal would have required the California Division of Workers’ Compensation to build out a statewide physician […]
Workers have won a big victory in the Federal courts, as the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that AB-5 can be enforced against the California trucking industry, and is not “pre-empted” by a Federal law known as the Federal Aviation Authorization Act of 1994. The California Trucking Association and two independent owner-operators had […]
Readers may be interested to note a recently published book, “Wounded Workers: Tales from a Working Man’s Shrink”. It’s authored by long-time Bay Area QME/AME Dr. Bob Larsen. Larsen, based out of San Francisco for much of his career, has been a clinical professor of psychiatry at UCSF and is a past president of the […]
We’re a year into the pandemic now. It’s been a time of stress and challenges, and they are not over. The chaos has been medical, financial, cultural, spiritual, educational. Members of some worker groups and ethnic/racial groups have been hit particularly hard. California’s workers and the workers’ comp community are still responding to the challenge, […]
Will the newly unveiled amended Medical-Legal Fee Schedule regulations result in a change in California workers’ comp culture? The proposed regs, likely to be officially adopted for use in April 2021, contain measures that have the potential to change how cases are often handled. The new California Medical-Legal Fee schedule (we’ll call it the MLFS) […]
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