In complex medico-legal cases—such as those involving acquired brain injury, neurological disorders, or long-term disability—it is often necessary to obtain expert opinions from multiple healthcare disciplines. Whether solicitors choose to instruct each expert separately or as a jointly instructed multidisciplinary team (MDT), both approaches offer distinct advantages and potential drawbacks.
Understanding how to instruct an MDT effectively is key to producing credible, comprehensive evidence that can withstand scrutiny and support the litigation process.
Pearl: Separate Instructions Provide Clear Professional Boundaries
Instructing each discipline separately—such as neuropsychologists, occupational therapists, physiotherapists, or speech and language therapists—ensures that each expert report reflects an independent, discipline-specific opinion. This approach clearly delineates professional responsibility and can be particularly useful in complex cases where experts may be called to give evidence separately at different stages of proceedings.
It also allows solicitors greater flexibility in commissioning reports according to litigation needs, especially where liability, causation, and quantum are being addressed sequentially.
Pitfall: Disconnected Reports Risk Inconsistency
When MDT members are instructed in isolation, there is a risk of duplication, contradiction, or gaps in coverage. For example, both a neuropsychologist and occupational therapist may comment on a client’s functional memory without being aware of each other’s assessments.
This can be mitigated by ensuring experts are aware of other disciplines involved in the case and, where appropriate, given access to prior reports or assessment data—while still maintaining the independence of their conclusions.
Pearl: Group Instructions Promote Integration and Holistic Insight
Alternatively, instructing an MDT as a group—either to produce a joint report or to coordinate their evaluations—can offer a more cohesive overview of the client’s presentation. This is particularly valuable when understanding the interaction between different domains of functioning, such as cognition, mobility, communication, and behaviour.
Group instructions allow experts to align assessment timelines, share clinical observations, and reduce client fatigue by avoiding repetitive testing. When coordinated properly, the result is a more efficient and unified body of evidence.
Pitfall: Blurred Responsibility in Joint Reports
One of the main challenges of group instruction is ensuring that each expert clearly defines the limits of their contribution. Joint reports must explicitly state which parts were authored by whom and which opinions are shared.
Each contributor still has an individual duty to the court, in accordance with Part 35 of the Civil Procedure Rules and must be prepared to stand behind their opinion independently—even when working collaboratively.
Pearl: Group Working Enhances Efficiency and Cost-Effectiveness
From a practical perspective, instructing an MDT as a group can reduce duplication of effort, limit administrative overheads, and offer solicitors a single point of contact for coordinated assessments. Clients may also benefit from a more streamlined assessment process, particularly if the team has prior experience working together in medico-legal settings.
At Medico-Legal Healthcare we offer flexible services tailored to the needs of each case. Our team of neuropsychologists and allied professionals can be instructed either individually or as part of a coordinated multidisciplinary team. Whether instructed separately or jointly, our experts provide clear, defensible, and clinically robust opinions that remain fully compliant with legal standards. We work closely with solicitors, case managers, and legal teams to ensure that every report is evidence-based, ethically sound, and aligned with the unique requirements of complex litigation.