Under the Maryland Workers’ Compensation law the employee has the right to choose whatever doctor he would like to see, as long as the doctor is willing to accept payments under the Maryland Workers’ Compensation fee schedule. In addition the employer has the right to have the injured employee seen by one of their doctors in order to determine if the treatment that the injured worker is receiving is necessary and reasonable, however, they have no right to demand that you treat with the doctor chosen by the employer.
In the real world, the system works differently.While the employee has a right to treat with the doctor of his choice, that choice is severely limited. First, many of doctors do not want to get involved in litigation and therefore do not want to accept patients with workers compensation claims.Numerous doctors do not like to do the paperwork the insurance companies demand. Few doctors like the delay in payment as the adjusters do not make paying medical bills a priority. The workers compensation law has a fee schedule that many doctors feel is too low so they are not willing to work for the low fees.
In the real world most doctors will not see you unless the insurance company provides an authorization and then timely pays you. Most insurance adjusters want you to go to their doctor so they usually refuse to provide the authorization.Then the only way to get authorization is by court order which can take months.
A few doctors will see you without authorization and are willing to deal with the delays and the litigation. However these doctors work on volume meaning they do alot of workers compensation only and are use to the red tape. These are the doctors that most claimant workers compensation lawyers refer their clients to.
The insurance companies have company clinics that they have contracts with, but they sell themselves to the insurance companies as insurance and employer friendly. These are to be avoided as their main interest is to provide low cost care not high quality care.