legal nurse consultant

Legal nurse consultants have both medical and legal knowledge which provides valuable expertise in medically-related litigation. They provide professional services, such as medical case review, records analysis, compilation of medically-related litigation materials, and collaboration with attorneys on medical-legal issues. A graduate degree and certification in the nurse legal consultant clinical specialty both help establish credibility.

"The legal nurse consultant is a licensed registered nurse who performs a critical analysis of healthcare facts and issues and their outcomes for the legal profession, healthcare professions, and others as appropriate. With a strong educational and experiential background, the legal nurse consultant is qualified to assess adherence to standards of healthcare practice as it applies to the nursing and healthcare professions." American Association of Legal Nurse Consultants

"A legal nurse consultant is part of an emerging field of experts used by law firms. In the past, only physicians and other types of experts were considered to assist attorneys with the medical aspects of their cases. Today, a legal nurse consultant provides an affordable alternative for law firms..."
National Institute for Paralegal Arts and Sciences

• Facilitating communication and thus strategizing with the legal professional for successful resolutions between parties involved in healthcare-related litigation or other medical-legal or healthcare-legal matters.
• Educating attorneys and/or others involved in the legal process regarding the healthcare facts and issues of a case or a claim.
• Researching and integrating healthcare and nursing literature, guidelines, standards, and regulations as related to the healthcare facts and issues of a case or claim.
• Reviewing, summarizing, and analyzing medical records and other pertinent healthcare and legal documents and comparing and correlating them to the allegations.
• Assessing issues of damages and causation relative to liability with the legal process.
• Identifying, locating, evaluating and conferring with expert witnesses.
  Interviewing witnesses and parties pertinent to the healthcare issues in collaboration with legal professionals.
• Drafting legal documents in medically related cases under the supervision of an attorney.
• Developing collaborative case strategies with those practicing within the legal system.
• Providing support during discovery, depositions, trial, and other legal proceedings.
• Testifying at depositions, hearings, arbitration, or trials as expert healthcare witnesses.
• Supporting the process of adjudication of legal claims.
• Contacting and conferring with vendors to develop demonstrative evidence or to collect costs of healthcare services, supplies, or equipment.
• Supervising and educating other nurses in the practice of legal nurse consulting

The only educational requirement to be a LNC is to hold a professional nursing license. If a nurse feels that further education would help their practice as a consultant, then there are courses available for LNCs through various sources.   courtesy :http://www.psna.org/Career/legalnurse.htm