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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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Then the insurance company doctors begin to cross-examine him and of course he goes all to pieces under cross-examination. He said, “I'm not so educated as you are, doctor.” By that legally he admits that he's no expert. So his testimony doesn't outweigh that of the insurance company doctor who is an expert, has been so qualified, and has never lot on that he wasn't an expert. So that the claimants have the worst of it in medical testimony. The medical testimony in close cases weighs very heavily - in cases where there is a contest as to whether the company should pay any more or not.

Therefore the Medical Department of the Workmen's Compensation Bureau comes to be of vast importance, because it's only by using our own doctors on our own premises who can make examinations on the spot that we have any grip on this situation and can overcome, if necessary, some of the testimony of the insurance company doctor. However, it's been very difficult to get into that medical department people who are competent to do more than make an examination and give a real estimate of what, we'll say, the degree of impairment of the motion of the arm is. To get an educated man who is competent in skill and in semantics to the experts brought in is really something.





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