Discussing legal costs with your medical lawyer

The first step in reducing legal costs and expenses is by discussing them with your medical lawyers or attorneys. If you and your medical lawyer have discussed the basis and nature of legal fees and costs, and if you have a written medical attorney's fee agreement, then you have taken a very important step in controlling your legal expenses.

Here are a few things to do to help both you and your medical attorney manage the overall fees and costs:

• Get organized: Right from the start, share as much information as you can with your medical lawyer. Think about the medical lawsuit in advance before talking to a medical lawyer. Write down the questions you want ask your medical attorney. This will help cut down the time that your medical lawyer will spend investigating the case and gathering information.

• Be thorough: Tell your medical attorney all the facts. Do not assume that your medical lawyer knows them all. Everything you tell your medical attorney will be kept in confidence and will not be admissible as evidence against you. So don't be afraid to tell him the truth. When your medical lawyer has sufficient knowledge about your case, surprises are avoided during the course of the representation.

• Be efficient: Try to be as concise as possible. In many circumstances you will pay for every minute you spend with your medical lawyer. A friendly relationship can facilitate the handling of your doctor malpractice case, but you should try to limit your discussions to your legal matter. You will not want to pay for a long, friendly conversation about non-legal matters.

• Communicate: You need to discuss the case with your medical lawyer and prepare for meetings. You are probably the main source of information about your doctor malpractice case. If something new happens, you should inform your medical attorney. It may change what the medical lawyer is doing on the case and save you and your medical attorney time and, of course, money.

• Examine your bill: Do your bills contain costs and expenses beyond those you agreed to pay for? If so, you should bring this to your medical attorney's attention at once and discuss the matter with him.
  

Even if your doctor malpractice case will be paid on a contingency basis, which is the usual practice, you should still check to see that costs and expenses are monitored and properly billed.