Brininger LTD

Judge Sparks appears fed up with technical objections to subpoenas when those technical objections serve only to waste time. He invited the lawyers to school in his courtroom. Told the lawyers to bring a sack lunch and their toothbrush so they could stay with the US Marshall if the session went past the lawyers' bedtime.

While testing a new research tool for my firm, I decided to look for cases in which CIGNA’s Book of Knowledge (Cigna’s claim manual) was quoted. (CIGNA and Life Insurance Company of North America are the same company). In one of my cases I wanted to see what court’s thought of Cigna’s failure to comply with its claim manual. This firm reviews its copy of the CIGNA’s Book of Knowledge and compares the actions in my Cigna case with the BOK.

As most you know, NMR (Network Medical Review, Inc.) and its sister company/subsidiary perform a large number of "independent" medical reviews at the request of various insurance companies.

In Denmark, the Plaintiff's counsel, Jonathan M. Feigenbaum [JonF@Phillips-Angley.Com] propounded discovery on Liberty Life to learn how much it pays to NMR each year and how may cases NMR reviewed at Liberty's request and how many NMR actually found were disabled.

According to UNUMProvident, the leading provider of disability insurance, the following are the five leading causes of long-term disability claims:

12 percent – Cancer
10 percent – Complications of pregnancy
10 percent – Joint/muscle/connective tissue diseases
9 percent – Back injuries
8 percent – Cardiovascular disease

Penalties for COBRA notice violations can be substantial.

A federal court in Nebraska recently imposed penalties of over $300,000 plus attorneys fees. Delcastillo v. Odyssey Resource Management Inc., 320 F. Supp. 2d 889 (D. Neb. 6/11/2004). Here, the court found that the participant and his family suffered particularly severe consequences as a result of the lack of health care coverage.