Every case this site prices has a second half no calculator can price: the medical award. The PD rating compensates permanent loss of function with a computable, finite number; future medical is an open-ended promise of treatment — and in serious cases it is worth more than the indemnity. This guide covers what it is, how it survives, and how it gets sold.
What the medical award is
Labor Code §4600 obligates the employer to provide treatment reasonably required to cure or relieve the effects of the injury — doctor visits, surgery, medication, hardware, home care where supported. Under a Stipulated Award it attaches to the accepted body parts, runs for life by default, and has no dollar cap. That “per body part” scope is why the list of compensable parts — the same list your rating is built from — is fought so hard: the medical award follows it.
What “lifetime” actually means
Lifetime access, not lifetime autopilot. Each treatment request passes utilization review (§4610) against the medical treatment schedule, and UR denials go to independent medical review. In practice the medical award is a standing right to run that process for the covered parts — powerful, but paperwork-bound. This is the half of the case that keeps a file open for decades.
Keep it or sell it
The two settlement shapes from the settlement guide split exactly here. A Stipulated Award pays the PD over time and keeps medical open — the worker keeps the treatment right, the defendant keeps the file. A Compromise & Release buys the medical award out: the lump sum exceeds the bare PD anchor precisely because it prices the medical tail — projected treatment, prescription costs, the risk of a surgery years out. That projection is a judgment call built on the medical record; it is the genuinely negotiated part of every C&R.
Where Medicare comes in
If the worker is a Medicare beneficiary (or close to it), a C&R that closes medical must account for Medicare’s interests — usually via a Medicare set-aside: a slice of the settlement earmarked for future injury-related treatment so those costs don’t shift to the federal program. MSAs change settlement timing and net recovery, and they are a pricing exercise, not a rating one — the rating side stays exactly as the money chart computes it.
The division of labor
Compute what computes; negotiate what doesn’t. The PD indemnity, life-pension exposure, and present value are arithmetic — the calculator produces them with the full audit trail. The medical tail resists arithmetic and rewards a well-documented file: accepted parts, treatment history, and honest projections. Parties who show up with the computable half nailed down negotiate the other half from strength.
RateString computes ratings and indemnity; medical-award valuation and settlement strategy are judgments for counsel. Not legal advice.