In the tradition of Joe Paduda and his excellent weblog (www.joepaduda.com), MEDVAL would like to make its own predictions as it relates to the Medicare Set Aside market in 2010.

1. Ringler Associates, the structured settlement firm, will try their hand at MSAs by hiring David Hays from Xchanging and cost their clients millions while they learn on the job.

2. Chartis will replace their current MMSEA reporting agent with ISO because the solution initially sold to them will not work as advertised.

3. Protocols will spend another $100,000 suing CMS and nothing will change. (But kudos for fighting the good fight)

4. HIG Capital will not find a buyer for PMSI as their turnaround strategy fails to take hold and clients realize WC PBM's have never lived up to their promise. Their iPhone app will be used by double the number of people as in 2009 which will be four.

5. Crowe Paradis will be this blog's #1 MSA industry reader exceeding their 228 visits in 2009. They will also change their incorrect marketing and no longer claim to be "the only national MSA firm to use both a nurse and attorney on every file" when they realize MEDVAL has been doing exactly that three years before they were founded.

6. Coventry will settle at least one lawsuit brought under their guaranteed MSA program of yesteryear.

7. An MMSEA reporting agent will not report an eligible claim(s) and their client will pay a $1,000 per day penalty.

8. One CMS official will officially acknowledge that MSAs are appropriate for liability claims.

9. Another CMS official will officially deny that MSAs are appropriate for liability claims.

10. Gould and Lamb will add new clients faster than they lose their old ones. 
 

We will revisit these predictions at the end of the year and see just how much comes to fruition.