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According to recent survey data published by IMS Institute for Healthcare Informatics, just about half of medical professionals have consulted Wikipedia, an online reference material that is sourced and edited by users without any formal credential checking. With more and more millennials consulting their online physicians before actually consulting a physical medical professional, the importance of accuracy and availability of information has never been more prevalent. But should it also be a little troubling that…

In what is the highest verdict for a minor outside of Cook County, yesterday Clifford Law Offices obtained a $16 million verdict for two teenagers who were killed in a grain bin incident in Mt. Carroll, Illinois, in 2010. Each of the boys’ families were awarded $8 million, a record in the state outside of Cook County in the wrongful death of a minor, according to John Kirkton of the Cook County Jury Verdict Reporter….

February 6, 2014 Kevin P. Durkin, attorney at Clifford Law Offices, obtained a record $16 million verdict on behalf of two families whose sons were killed in a grain bin entrapment incident in Northwestern Illinois. Following a two-and-a-half-week trial, the Carroll County jury deliberated just eight hours before granting $8 million to each of the two plaintiffs’ families who were working at Haasbach at a Consolidated Grain and Barge Company grain elevator. The previous record…

Clifford’s Notes, Chicago Lawyer February 5, 2014 By Robert A. Clifford I recall reading a story about 10 years ago that I still find disturbing: On a cross-country flight, a lawyer sat next to the president of one of the firm’s top clients. When the president discovered the lawyer was the managing partner of the firm, he commented, “Yes, your firm used to be our lawyers.” The company had stopped sending work to that firm…

A new study conducted by medical researchers at the Buffalo campus of the State University of New York system has concluded that obesity is responsible for a lack of seatbelt usage that greatly increases the risk of fatality for individuals already living with obesity. Sounding eerily similar to conclusions drawn by a team of researchers looking into the redesign of airplane seatbelts for larger occupants, the team leader, Dr. Dietrich Jehle, is calling for immediate…

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA), a federal agency tasked with keeping the American public aware of potential health risks like E. Coli and pharmaceutical side effects, is warning that there could be a link between testosterone-boosting pills and increased risk of heart problems and fatalities. According to the Chicago Tribune, many men take these drugs due to the persuasive nature of the marketing efforts that coined the phrase “low-T” without fully researching the possible…

Robert A. Clifford, senior partner at Clifford Law Offices, wrote a column for the February issue of the Chicago Lawyer on the importance of staying in touch with clients (“If communication is rockin’, the ARDC won’t come a knockin’”). Click here to read the entire column: Clifford’s Notes, Chicago Lawyer. He offers some important tips as well as answers that are provided by the Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission (ARDC) at iardc.org. The column…

That’s the title of a two-page article that appeared in the February issue of the Chicago Lawyer on Clifford Law Offices. The reporter, Dustin J. Seibert, said, “That’s the feeling that surfaces just after you step off the elevator on the 31st floor of 120 N. LaSalle St. and into Clifford Law Offices.” Time and again, clients and visitors alike have described walking into the firm’s offices as if walking into one’s living room, and…

The 7th annual Continuing Legal Education Series sponsored by Clifford Law Offices will be held on February 20th, 2014. The Chicago law firm will be hosting a complimentary webinar on “The Ethics of Client Communications” that focuses on the best communication practices to benefit people in the legal world. The event will also focus on the challenges of ethical communications, such as limitations on what can be said online, how to ethically handle online reviews,…