Upcoming Events

An employer cannot direct care in Illinois, and the instances in which an employe can communicate directly with a medical provider are very limited.

Illinois Courts have repeatedly held an employer and its insurance carrier are prohibited from communicating directly with the treating medical providers due to the doctor-patient relationship and privilege.

We will discuss the privilege, the court’s rulings in Petrillo and Hydraulics, the penalty the Commission and courts when the privilege is violated and provide you with recommendations for what you can communicate to the treating physician and how to do it.

September of 2025 will mark five years since the Illinois Supreme Court decided the McAllister case.

We will take a look back at Commission and Appellate Court decisions since to see what effect the McAllister case had on when and how employer’s present accident defenses.

The timely payment of benefits is a cornerstone of the Workers’ Compensation Act.

While the Illinois statute does not impose mandatory penalties, there are instances when the Commission finds an employer’s nonpayment of benefits was so egregious the Commission awards penalties and attorney fees.

We will discuss when penalties are awarded and how you can avoid putting yourself at risk of having penalties assessed against you.

We will round out 2025 by discussing not how to avoid cold weather exposure, but how to properly evaluate your exposure for permanency on both litigated and pro se cases.

Bring your case scenarios to this session and ask the experts what they think a case is worth!