By Hon. Colleen Casey, Former Commissioner, California Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board Just when you thought the right of “due process” was on the brink of destruction, the legislature...
By Hon. Susan V. Hamilton, Former Assistant Secretary and Deputy Commissioner, California Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board Over the past several decades California has implemented broad legislative...
CALIFORNIA COMPENSATION CASES Vol. 89, No. 9 September 2024 A Report of En Banc and Significant Panel Decisions of the WCAB and Selected Court Opinions of Related Interest, With a Digest of WCAB Decisions...
By Thomas A. Robinson, co-author, Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law Editorial Note: All section references below are to Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, unless otherwise indicated...
By Hon. Colleen Casey, Former Commissioner, California Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board One of the most common reasons evaluating physicians flunk the apportionment validity test is due to their...
A secretary at a medical facility, who claimed she suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder after she responded to the suicide of a patient, is entitled to workers’ compensation benefits, held a New York court. Affirming a decision of the state Board, the court held that psychological injuries caused by witnessing the aftermath of a suicide could be compensable where the claimant was an active participant in the tragedy, as opposed to a mere bystander. Evidence showed that a patient leapt from a window at the facility where claimant worked and impaled himself on picnic tables outside claimant’s office. She was one of the first workers to reach the scene and, despite her lack of medical training, was directed by her supervisor to retrieve an oxygen tank for the patient. The secretary did so, but began to feel anxious and hyperventilate and “lost it” altogether after she was ordered by facility officials not to speak to investigators about her prior interactions with the patient. Substantial evidence supported the Board’s determination that claimant was an active participant.
Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is a leading commentator and expert on the law of workers’ compensation.
LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis
See Demperio v. Onondaga County, 2015 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 2561 (3rd Dep’t, Mar. 26, 2015)
See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 56.04
Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law.
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