AMA Authors: Sixth Edition Isn't Sole Determiner of Disability

Some of the doctors who crafted the Sixth Edition of the American Medical Association (AMA) Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment warned it will take a large number of cases to fully gauge the impact of the major shift in approach contained in the new edition.But Dr. Christopher R. Brigham, the senior contributing editor for the guides, and Dr. Elizabeth Genovese, a sections editor for the guides, say one thing hasn't changed: The guides cannot be used as the sole determiner of disability, despite a change that expands physicians' ability to include everyday functions in the...