Training > Online Training: AMA Guides 6th Edition

Sixth Edition of the AMA Guides: Learning the New Standard
www.sixthedition.com  

Online training is the convenient, efficient, and effective way to learn the new Sixth Edition of the AMA Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment – the most current guidelines for assessing impairment. This is is one of the many tools available to you as a subscriber to www.sixthedition.com. This exceptional resource can either be your primary learning resource or used to supplement a traditional seminar. Individuals report it is very difficult to learn the Sixth Edition simply by reading the book - it is far better to have an experienced mentor who clearly explains and illustrates the process with case exercises.

You will learn from Christopher R. Brigham, MD, the Senior Contributing Editor, who was also a primary contributor for the musculoskeletal chapters, as well as Editor of the Guides Casebook and Guides Newsletter. The program is designed for a multi-disciplinary audience – physicians, attorneys, claims professionals, fact-finders (judges, hearing officers), and others involved in workers’ compensation, personal injury, and motor vehicle casualty cases.

• View (and review) the content on demand. With live programs you are exposed to the content once; however with the Sixth Edition it is best to review content based on specific issues (and cases) you will encounter.

• Gain access to recordings of actual live training programs and also separate recorded presentations in Flash format (permitting instant access to specific sessions).

  • Approaches which are exemplified by case exercises, contrasting ratings from the Sixth Edition with those from earlier editions;

  • Musculoskeletal impairment assessment (chapters which Dr. Brigham authored);

  • Visual graphics that illustrate the step-by-step process.

• To ease the process of performing and reviewing impairment ratings, access functional inventories used in the Guides, including the Pain Disability Questionnaire (PDQ), QuickDASH, and AAOS Lower Limb Outcome Scale – with online scoring and printing!

• Other tools include inventory and recording forms facilitating the use of the Sixth Edition, together with Case Exercises.

• In addition, gain access to articles on topics of importance to you and online rating guidance for the most commonly encountered diagnoses.

• Submit questions that are answered in monthly subscriber teleconference calls. These calls are also recorded to listen to at your convenience. You may also view Frequently Asked Questions online.

• Save the cost of travel and being away from your office (costs that may exceed by several times the cost of a traditional seminar).

Learn the fundamental differences, including: 

• How the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) is used as a framework to generate five impairment classes;

• Diagnosis-based grids and adjustment grids are used to define a specific impairment;

• Standardized methodology is applied to each chapter to enhance the relevancy of impairment ratings, improve internal consistency and promote ease of application to the rating process;

• Functionally based histories, physical findings and broadly accepted objective clinical test results are integrated where applicable to help physicians determine the grade within the impairment class.

Impairment assessment has evolved with the AMA Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment and this has resulted in both challenges and opportunities for the evaluator and those relying on impairment ratings. If you are involved in performing, reviewing or managing impairment ratings you need to have access to these unique online learning resources.

Learning Objectives with www.sixthedition.com  

As a result of this learning opportunity, you will be able to: 

• Discuss the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) and its role in impairment evaluation.

• Explain the reasons for revision of our prior approaches to impairment assessment.

• Describe how to determine Diagnosis-Based Impairments, and make adjustments on the basis of the results of Functional History, Physical Examination, and Clinical Studies.

• Demonstrate the ability to score Functional Inventories (including the QuickDASH, Lower Limb Outcome Scale, and Pain Disability Questionnaire).

• Explain why methods used in previous editions (such as spinal range of motion assessment and strength determination) are no longer determinates.

• Demonstrate the ability to rate most commonly rated disorders, including spinal pain, upper limb disorders (hand, wrist, elbow, shoulders and entrapments), lower limb disorders (foot / ankle, knee and foot), nervous system disorders, and pain. 

Seminar Director

Christopher R. Brigham, MD is the Chairman of Impairment Resources, LLC (www.impairment.com).  He is the Senior Contributing Editor for the AMA Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment, Sixth Edition and was a contributor / author for several chapters, including Upper Extremities, Lower Extremities and Spine. With the Fifth Edition he served on the Advisory Committee and as a contributor. Dr. Brigham is Board-Certified in Occupational Medicine (ABPM), Founding Director of the American Board of Independent Medical Examiners (ABIME), a Certified Independent Medical Examiner (CIME), a Certified Impairment Rater (CIR), a Fellow of the American Academy of Disability Evaluating Physicians (FAADEP) with Certification in Evaluation of Disability and Impairment Rating (CEDIR), and a Fellow of the American College of Occupational Environmental Medicine (FACOEM), and a graduate of the Washington University School of Medicine – St. Louis. 

Dr. Brigham is also the Editor of the AMA publications Guides Newsletter and the Guides Casebook. He is co-author of the text Understanding the AMA Guides in Workers Compensation, has written over one hundred published articles on impairment and disability evaluation and other texts, chaired the Medical Advisory Board for the Medical Disability Advisor, Fourth Edition, is featured in several video, audio and web-based productions in the medicolegal field, and has trained thousands of physicians, attorneys, claims professionals and fact-finders, throughout the US, Canada and internationally. He is an experienced professional speaker. As a clinician with over twenty five years experience, he has performed several thousand independent medical and impairment evaluations, providing him with excellent insight to the complexities of human potential, impairment and disability. As a result of this experience he has consulted for numerous organizations (including governmental jurisdictions). His curriculum vitae is available at http://www.impairment.com/PDFFiles/BrighamC_CV.pdf