I'm not sure I'm ready but the doctor has released me to return to work.

This may be for a couple of different reasons. First, the doctor may have a standing agreement with your adjuster or employer that he won’t keep workers’ compensation claimants out of work as long as your employer will find something, anything, for you to be doing.

Second, many doctors believe there is a healing power in being active and out of the house. While we think that this may be overstated sometimes we’ve seen plenty of instances where clients were worse off sitting in the house afraid to go out because of the network of private investigators working for the insurance company than they would be if they could be active and stay in shape.

Third, the doctor may honestly not have a good idea what your job actually entails. Part of this is that they live in their own world sometimes, but we have seen a lot of instances where a rehabilitation professional gave the doctor a job description which had been edited – sometimes by the RP, sometimes by the employer – to remove all the heavy lifting from it. Thus the doctor is relying on what he believes to be an accurate statement of your job. Don’t count on your employer or your nurse showing this to you in advance. More than one client has reported having a nurse whip out a job description unannounced and presenting it to the doctor.