Heather Beckett highlights the complexities of dental injuries & medical reporting agencies
The increase in personal injury claims which invariably accompanies an economic downturn has proved the age-old adage that it is an ill wind that blows nobody any good. However, in order to minimise costs in relatively low-value claims, high volume, no-win, no-fee solicitors’ firms are increasingly turning to medical reporting agencies (MRAs) to administer the sourcing of records together with the practical aspects of expert instruction and necessary provision of reports.
While this may work for a great proportion of run of the mill slip and trip injuries, there are some differences between medicine and dentistry which mean that this approach often needs to be adapted. One of the most significant is that records differ. There are also differences between, for instance, bones and teeth in the way they heal following injury. This can mean that prognosis following a dental injury is far from straightforward. When it is also realised that teeth ravaged by dental disease may have been repaired by techniques which themselves cause overall damage—however appropriate those methods may be—it becomes apparent
