Frequently Asked Questions
What
is your time frame for assessments and reports?- Is there a waiting list?
- Where do assessments take place?
- What can an occupational therapist contribute to the schedule of special damages?
- What are the characteristics of a good expert witness?
- What is the range of Clare Garside’s medico-legal experience?
- What evidence informs expert opinion?
- What types of loss are identified?
- How is information presented?
- What can I expect from expert opinion?
- Can you deal with any disability?
- Can you provide an immediate needs assessment?
- Do you assess individual capacity unrelated to loss?
- Can an occupational therapy report help with accommodation issues?
- Can you assess occupational ability?
- Do you act in disability equipment disputes?
- Can you help with service–user complaints?
- Can you undertake an access audit?
- Do you assess for disability equipment?
- Why do you only offer clinical treatment locally?
- What is the range of Clare Garside’s clinical experience?
- What happens when Assessability receives an enquiry?
- What happens when Assessability receives an instruction?
- What is my guarantee of quality?
- How are costs agreed?
- Does Assessability offer deferred terms?
- Does Assessability charge a cancellation fee?
What is your time frame for assessments and reports?
We will normally:
- Respond to an enquiry within forty-eight hours
- Visit an injured or disabled person within four weeks of instruction
- Deliver a completed report within four weeks of the visit
Is there a waiting list?
Sometimes. Since the exact timing is governed by workload, we would confirm the position initially on enquiry, and again on receipt of an instruction. It is sometimes possible to undertake an earlier assessment visit in urgent cases.
Where do assessments take place?
It is usually essential that an occupational therapy assessment of an injured or disabled person’s functioning takes place in their own home, and occasionally in their workplace.
Assessability is based in Preston, Lancashire, but we receive instructions from throughout the UK and have visited clients from Aberdeen to Canterbury and the Isle of Man. We are also prepared to work outside the UK in appropriate cases.
What can an occupational therapist contribute to the schedule of special damages?
We can provide an occupational therapy expert witness report that delivers well-evidenced and fully costed detail of the need for care, disability equipment and adapted accommodation, as well as quantifying other losses, with reference to a persons situation prior to the personal injury or medical negligence index event.
Clare Garside’s experience testify to her occupational therapy skills, but she is also able to bring to bear the personal skills listed below that ensure an effective assessment.
- Empathy
An ability to work with people who may be suffering or embarrassed and to see the challenges they face from their perspective. - Tact
An ability to obtain the necessary, often very personal, information while enabling an individual to maintain their dignity and sense of self-respect. - Confidentiality
Recognition of the importance of individual privacy and dignity, and of the importance of safeguarding any personal or commercial information with which one has been entrusted. (Assessability is, of course, registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office and ensures compliance with the Data Protection Act.)
What are the characteristics of a good expert witness?
- Professional expertise
A glance at Clare Garside’s résumé reveals her expertise. She first qualified as an occupational therapist in 1976 and has been relied upon to provide expert witness reports since 1988. She commits to continuing professional development and has current clinical experience. - Independence and focus
Clare Garside is aware of her duty to the Court, rather than the party instructing her. She is equally happy to accept instructions on behalf of the claimant, the defence or as a single joint expert and bases her recommendations solely on her professional judgement and the needs of injured party. - Diligence
Assessability supports Clare Garside’s work with carefully devised systems of scrutiny to facilitate the completeness of evidence, the accuracy of findings and the clarity of opinion. - Communication
Clare Garside’s communication skills are manifest in her ability to present focused written information clearly and in appropriate detail and to transact effectively in Court.
What is the range of Clare Garside’s medico-legal experience?
Clare Garside co-authored her first medico legal report in 1984 and established a specialist care and rehabilitation cost consultancy in 1988. This partnership, Direction Consultants, incorporated in 2002 to become Assessability.
She is trained in writing medico-legal reports
and giving evidence in Court. During her time in practice she has acted
as an expert
witness in a wide range of cases, including:
- Accidents at work
- Road traffic accidents
- Tripping and slipping
- Medical negligence at birth and beyond
What evidence informs expert opinion?
Clare Garside’s expertise is founded on a commitment to evidence-based practice. She has excellent communication skills and a strong knowledge of activity metrics (for example, the independently surveyed times required for activities of daily living and childcare), assistive technology products and rehabilitative services.
Documentation such as medical reports and records, together with witness statements, are the starting point for the collection of evidence, while a thorough occupational therapy functional assessment involving questioning, observation and sometimes measurement provides a cornerstone for her opinion.
What types of loss are identified?
An occupational therapy care and rehabilitation report addresses all relevant heads of claim in quantum terms and considers both past and likely future losses. Typically a report might cover:
- Personal care services and equipment
- Domestic care and loss of domestic services
- Loss of other services such as childcare
- Equipment to facilitate domestic work
- Mobility equipment and services
- Housing needs and necessary adaptation
- Therapy and leisure needs
- Other recoverable domestic losses resulting from the index injury
How is information presented?
Findings, recommendations and costings are communicated in clear and concise detail in the Expert’s report. Additionally Clare Garside will, as required:
- Respond to questions
Hold a discussion with other experts to agree a Joint Statement
Attend a conference with counsel
Attend Court to give oral testimony
What can I expect from expert opinion?
Clearly this depends on the initial instruction, however, a typical care and rehabilitation report from Assessability would:
- Establish a rich picture of an injured party’s prior lifestyle, including pre-existing conditions, as a benchmark against which to assess loss
- Summarise the nature and impact of the index injury
- Present well-evidenced detail of loss in qualitative and quantitative terms
- Provide well-researched recommendations of services and equipment to, as far as possible, replace or offset lost functionality and satisfactions.
Can you deal with any disability?
Yes. As a very well experienced occupational therapist
Clare Garside can assess disability needs arising from a wide range of
conditions, including:
- acquired brain injury
- amputation
- back injury
- burns
- fractures
- head injuries
- industrial disease / injury
- lower or upper limb injury
- multiple injuries / trauma
- neurological injuries
- orthopaedic injuries
- spinal cord injury
Can you provide an immediate needs assessment?
Yes. An immediate needs assessment yields a simpler report that omits evaluation of an injured person’s past and longer-term future needs to focus on the nature and cost of their current requirements.
As long as we have the capacity we will try to provided this type of report within six weeks of instruction, and at a ceiling cost.
Do you assess individual capacity unrelated to loss?
Yes. We might be asked to assess a person’s ability to care for a dependent child or vulnerable adult, or to live independently. Such assessments are usually related to divorce or other Family Law cases, to inform requests for statutory or charitable support, and less commonly, to inform fertility ethics decisions.
Can an occupational therapy report help with accommodation issues?
Yes. An occupational therapy assessment of accommodation needs can be of great value in supporting requests for adaptations or appropriate housing to accommodate disabled or autistic children and adults. Typically, the accommodation needs reports we prepare are commissioned to inform:
- Public Law requests for statutory provision of adaptations or appropriate accommodation
- Family law decisions about the accommodation provision to be made for a disabled partner or child.
Can you assess occupational ability?
Yes, in person-related terms. An occupational therapist can undertake a workplace assessment that examines the physical and attitudinal requirements of a job and the extent to which an employees personal abilities and resources match those requirements.
Such assessments often include recommendations for options to make reasonable adjustments such as possibly adapting a job specification and/or offering supportive equipment or services.
Do you act in disability equipment disputes?
Yes. Clare Garside will accept instruction as an expert witness in cases within her experience where the appropriateness of prescription or the functioning of disability equipment is in dispute.
Can you help with service–user complaints?
Yes. Many services have a complaints procedure that incorporates an independent review stage. Where the service is occupational therapy related, Clare Garside can evaluate the extent to which the service conformed, in the case in question, to its own and relevant external procedures and codes of practice.
Can you undertake an access audit?
Yes. Occupational therapists are trained to be aware of the access difficulties experienced by people with mobility and sensory disabilities and can make recommendations to facilitate their access in compliance with the requirements of the Disability Discrimination Act.
Do you assess for disability equipment?
Yes. Most commonly assessments are for mobility equipment such as scooters or powered wheelchairs where supply is to be supported by charitable funding.
Why do you only offer clinical treatment locally?
Clinical occupational therapy normally requires a series of short periods of intervention. Under these circumstances the cost of travel to visit an injured party can become higher than the cost of treatment and it is for this reason that we recommend a therapist is sourced who is local to the client’s home.
What is the range of Clare Garside’s clinical experience?
Clare Garside first worked as a civilian occupational therapist (OT) in an RAF hospital where she gained experience of treating a wide range of physical injuries.
Her current expertise stems from sound career progression within the NHS, cumulating in a role as Head OT running a psychiatric day hospital. She maintains clinical contact via a small freelance commitment to the NHS, where she contributes specialist wheelchair and seating skills.
What happens when Assessability receives an enquiry?
We aim to respond to a written enquiry within three working days, but in fact, responses are often far quicker. If we are given sufficient details of a potential instruction we will include an estimate of likely cost with our reply.
What happens when Assessability receives an instruction?
We will respond to an instruction with a firm assessment date and confirmed estimate of cost and terms.
In the unlikely event that clarification of the instruction is necessary, we will seek this along with confirmation of acceptance of our terms.
We will make an appointment to visit the disabled or injured person their home and/or workplace (or school, if a child). Typically, this visit will be within 4 weeks of instruction.
After the visit we will prepare and despatch a report of findings and recommendations, normally within four weeks of the visit date.
What is my guarantee of quality?
- A long-established practice
Assessability was established in its original partnership form in 1988 and has been relied upon to provide clear, accurate and well-evidenced reports for over 20 years. - Externally checked work
References on our work were taken-up originally by the Law Society and that function has now devolved to Sweet & Maxwell. Clare Garside also has 1st tier accreditation from the Association of Personal injury Lawyers (APIL) and is a member of the British Association of Occupational Therapist (BAOT) and the Society of Expert Witnesses. - Excellent business support systems
As a well respected practitioner and expert witness Clare Garside is supported within Assessability by well-developed information technology and business systems that enable those instructing us to have confidence that their requirements will be fully understood and their expectations met or exceeded on time and on budget. - Health Professions Council (HPC) Registration
Clare Garside is HPC registered. Their role is to protect clients from professional incompetence and malpractice and although occupational therapy practitioner cases are only very rarely brought before them, they provide a valuable public safeguard. - Professional Indemnity insurance.
We trust that it is even less likely that our own work would be called into question, but nevertheless have industry-standard professional indemnity insurance of £5 million.
How are costs agreed?
Assessability has competitive hourly fees for professional work and travel. However, of equal importance to the hourly rate is knowledge of how long the report will take to research and compile.
We will always submit a cost estimate for producing the complete report. This will be expressed as a narrow price range, from minimum to maximum and affords the client a good degree of certainty with regard to cost. The estimate details al the elements of cost such as assessment, report research and preparation, travel time and mileage.
Should new information come to light resulting in a report requiring amendment, or a joint statement, conference with council or attendance at court be required, each of which might likely incur additional costs, theses would be agreed before additional work is undertaken.
Court appearances are charged on an agreed day rate basis, in half-day increments.
Does Assessability offer deferred terms?
Yes. Fee rates are available for cases requiring more extended settlement terms and payment can be deferred for up to one year.
Does Assessability charge a cancellation fee?
Sometimes. Visit expenses actually incurred will be charged if an assessment is aborted on the instruction of the client or as a result of the disabled of injured person’s absence at the appointed time and place.
If a court appearance is cancelled with more than 72 hours’ notice, only a half-day’s preparation time will be charged. Where less than 72 hours’ notice is given, preparation time and any travelling costs will be charged as incurred.
home
expert witness other
OT services costs &
terms résumé
FAQ references
& links contact
us
Copyright 2005 to 2011 Assessability Limited