Internal intake review
Fast and economical for straightforward matters. Complex causation, competing pathology, or functional questions may require a physician layer before the firm commits substantial cost.
A physician-authored case screening memo calibrated to how the defense will challenge the medical record — not just whether the treatment was clinically appropriate. Know if the case holds before you commit the expert.
Mechanism support: Does the documented injury mechanism align with the claimed pathology at the claimed severity?
Pre-existing conditions: What prior pathology exists, and what is the likely documentation impact on causation?
Treatment gaps & inconsistencies: Where are the documentation vulnerabilities a defense reviewer will exploit?
Expert specialty: What type of expert does this case require — and what documentation must be in place before engagement?
Defense review projection: How is a medical reviewer likely to evaluate this claim under standard utilization criteria?
You are deciding whether to retain an expert. The CVA is priced below most expert retainer entry costs.
High-volume PI firms receiving dozens of cases monthly. Physician screening separates strong records from vulnerable ones.
Initial medical exposure assessment before committing reserve — physician-authored analysis of what the record supports and where the plaintiff's case is most exposed.
Cases where the defense has signaled it will challenge causation aggressively.
Cases with significant prior spinal degeneration, previous injury, or comorbid conditions.
Firms may treat the fee as a case cost, subject to their engagement agreement, applicable law, and case outcome. The $350 screen may be credited toward a substantially overlapping larger engagement commissioned within 30 days. Bundle with IME Deconstruction + Defense Medical Lens™ from $1,250 →
Defense & institutional buyers: Invoiced at scope confirmation. Net 15 terms. Retainer arrangements available for recurring volume.
A useful viability screen does not declare that a case will win or lose. It determines whether the available medical evidence is coherent enough to justify further investigation, identifies what remains missing, and shows which issues are likely to consume expert time.
A compelling client narrative can coexist with a medically weak record, while a poorly organized file can obscure a supportable claim. The screening task is to separate those situations. Medisprudence tests whether the alleged mechanism is compatible with the documented pathology, whether symptoms and function evolve in a clinically intelligible way, and whether treatment choices are supported by the contemporaneous record.
The conclusion is framed as a triage decision: proceed, proceed only after specified documentation is obtained, or do not escalate on the present record. That wording matters. It keeps the screen honest, preserves uncertainty, and gives counsel an action list rather than a vague impression of “merit.”
The injury, causation, disability, necessity, or standard-of-care question is stated precisely so the review does not drift into issues the records cannot answer.
Key symptoms, objective findings, treatment, response, function, and prior history are placed in temporal sequence without creating an unnecessarily long chronology.
Mechanism, anatomy, timing, severity, treatment intensity, and functional limitation are compared for consistency and plausible alternative explanations.
Pre-existing disease, delayed care, noncompliance, symptom inconsistency, sparse objective findings, and unsupported future treatment are examined as likely pressure points.
The memo states what the current record supports, what it does not support, and which missing item could materially change the conclusion.
The best screen uses the smallest record set capable of answering the proposed question. Sending every available page without identifying the theory can increase cost without improving the decision.
The report is organized around decisions, not merely diagnoses. Each concern is linked to the evidence and graded by whether it is curable, contextual, or fundamental.
The CVA is a focused go/no-go or proceed-with-conditions screen. The full report is a deeper integrated analysis used after the matter justifies comprehensive record work.
Yes. The same structured review can estimate the medical strength of an asserted claim and identify where exposure is concentrated, subject to conflict screening.
No. The significance depends on the condition, expected follow-up, documented reason, and what occurred before and after the interval.
The report distinguishes absence of evidence from evidence against the theory and identifies the missing item most likely to change the assessment.
Mechanism assessment, pre-existing analysis, treatment gap mapping, and expert guidance. Fictional clinical data.
Screening tells you whether the case holds; Medical Charge & Necessity Review tells you whether the claimed medical specials are necessary, related, coded correctly, and reasonable in amount.
No PHI required to start.