Nebraska: Massive Stroke Unrelated to Injury Does Not Change Claimant’s PTD Status

That a permanently disabled claimant subsequently suffered a massive stroke that was unrelated to her workplace injury and which left her completely incapacitated and unable to care for herself did not alter the fact that she was still permanently disabled under the state Workers’ Compensation Act, held the Supreme Court of Nebraska. Casting aside the employer’s argument that the employee’s continuingdisability was the result of her stroke, and not her injury, the high court stressed that the claimant’s work-related disability had not ceased. The fact that the employee suffered a subsequent stroke that was neither medically nor causally related, did not relieve the employer of its obligation to pay PTD benefits under the Nebraska Workers’ Compensation Act.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance.

See Krause v. Five Star Quality Care, 301 Neb. 612, 2018 Neb. LEXIS 188 (Nov. 16, 2018)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 131.03.

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law

For a more detailed discussion of the case, See