VA: Rehab Professor’s Self-Diagnosis Proves Painful in Neck and Wallet

A decision by a rehabilitation counseling professor to seek out and follow a physical therapy regime utilizing a “Thera-Band” (a resistive latex exercise band), in spite of the fact that her treating physician told her that she did not need such therapy, meant that the neck injuries she sustained while exercising at home were not compensable, held a Virginia appellate court recently.  Quoting Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law to the effect that ordinarily an employer is responsible for every natural consequence that flows from a compensable injury—while at a conference in New Orleans, the professor tripped on a broken sidewalk, fell, and dislocated her shoulder—the appellate court agreed with the Commission that here the physical therapy was not medically necessary and that the professor self-medicated at her own risk.  For additional discussion, see http://www.workcompwriter.com/virginia-self-treatment-by-rehab-professor-nixes-benefits-for-subsequent-injuries/

Reported by Thomas A. Robinson, J.D.

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance. Bracketed citations link to lexis.com.

See Reid v. Virginia Commonwealth Univ., 2013 Va. App. LEXIS 294 (Oct. 22, 2013) [2013 Va. App. LEXIS 294 (Oct. 22, 2013)]

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 10.01 [10.01]

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

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