"They want me to see their doctor."

Which kind of appointment is it?

A treating doctor inside the employer's Medical Provider Network. Most California employers have an MPN, and if yours does, your treatment generally has to happen inside it. But an MPN is a list, not a person. You choose from it, and after the first visit you can switch to any other doctor in the network without asking permission. If you do not like the first one, change.

A medical-legal evaluation — a QME or an AME. This is not treatment. It is an examination to resolve a dispute, and the report will drive your permanent disability rating. You do have to attend. But the selection of that evaluator is governed by rules with very short deadlines, and how the panel is obtained matters enormously. How the QME process works.

Telling them apart matters, because your options are completely different. If the letter mentions a "panel," a "specialty," or "Qualified Medical Evaluator," it is medical-legal.

The first 30 days

If you did not predesignate a personal physician before the injury, the employer controls your medical care for the first 30 days after you report it. After that, you may switch — but if there is an MPN, you switch to someone else inside the MPN.

The form that would have changed this

Labor Code § 4600(d) lets you predesignate your own personal physician — but the requirements are strict and every one of them has to be met before the injury:

• You must have health insurance covering non-occupational injuries
• The doctor must be your primary care physician who has treated you before
• The doctor must agree in advance, and agree to retain your records
• Your employer must be notified in writing before the injury happens

Chiropractors, acupuncturists, and psychologists cannot be predesignated under this provision.

And employers with an MPN are required to give you the predesignation form and notice when you are hired or before the end of your first pay period. Most workers never see it.

If you are reading this and you are not injured: predesignate today. It is the single most valuable ten minutes of paperwork in California workers' compensation, and it is worthless after the fact.

What to do at the appointment

Describe every body part that hurts, at the first visit. A body part not mentioned early becomes a fight later.

Describe the mechanism accurately, including if it developed over time rather than in one moment. Cumulative trauma claims.

Say what you cannot do at home, not just at work. Impairment ratings in several body systems are driven by activities of daily living, and evaluators write down what they are told.

Do not exaggerate and do not minimize. Minimizing is the more common mistake and it is the more expensive one.