Hawaii: Injured Worker Should Receive New Device to Treat Tinnitus

The Supreme Court of Hawaii, vacating a lower court decision, held that substantial evidence showed that a new type of neuromonics device was “reasonably needed” for treating an injured worker’s tinnitus, and that based on this finding, the worker was not medically stable and unable to return to work. The Court said that both the Labor and Industrial Relations Appeals Board (LIRAB) and the state’s Intermediate Court of Appeals (ICA) had utilized an incorrect standard when they determined that the device, which incorporates a neural stimulus into music to interrupt and desensitize the brain from continued perception of tinnitus, was not “reasonable and necessary.” The Court noted that under the applicable statute, Haw. Rev. Stat. § 386–24 (1993), the issue was not whether the device was “reasonable and necessary,” but rather whether the device was “reasonably needed for the employee’s greatest possible medical rehabilitation” [emphasis added]. “Reasonably needed,” while not defined by statute, was less restrictive than the standard applied by the LIRAB and the ICA, said the Court.

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

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

See Pulawa v. Oahu Constr. Co., 2015 Haw. LEXIS 295 (Nov. 4, 2015) [2015 Haw. LEXIS 295 (Nov. 4, 2015)]

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 94.03 [94.03]

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

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