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Pino v. State2/17/2000
that stated, A>Mr. Barnes present condition is the result of his original injury on 3/29/67.=@ Id.
Following a hearing, Barnes was awarded hospital and medical benefits as well as benefits for temporary total disability. Id. at 217. The Worker=s Compensation Division objected and appealed to the district court, arguing that the claim was time barred. Id. This court affirmed the award and quoted from the district court=s order:
A * * * he Court finding that the claim of the petitioner concerns on-going treatment necessitated by the petitioners previous injury on March 29, 1967 and that all proper claims are allowable.
AIT IS THEREFORE ORDERED that the petition to reopen is not necessary and that all proper claims presented by the petitioner shall be allowed as part of the petitioners original claim.@ Id.
An industrial accident can give rise to more than one compensable injury . See, Rupe, 741 P.2d at 610; Malkowski, 741 P.2d at 605; Matter of Barnes, 587 P.2d at 218; and Scullion, 62 P.2d at 539. When this principle is applied to the present case, there is no way to distinguish Evenson=s injury and his multiple surgeries from the cases cited above. Evenson=s back injury, followed by fusion surgery, is identical to the situation in Matter of Barnes, and is very similar to the facts in Rupe and Malkowski. In each case, a man suffered an injury during his employment which required relatively immediate medical attention for which he was promptly compensated. Rupe, 741 P.2d at 610; Malkowski, 741 P.2d at 604; Matter of Barnes, 587 P.2d at 216; Scullion, 62 P.2d at 539. Each man then required additional surgery at a later date and was ultimately awarded benefits under the second compensable injury rule. Rupe, 741 P.2d at 610; Malkowski, 741 P.2d at 605-06; Matter of Barnes, 587 P.2d at 219; Scullion, 62 P.2d at 532.
Nothing in this instance serves to substantially distinguish Pino=s circumstances from those in the cited cases. The Findings of Fact by the hearing examiner read very much like the material facts reported in the cited cases. Further, there is no indication of internal inconsistencies between the testimony of Pino and his treating physicians like those that caused this court to affirm in Matter of Krause, 803 P.2d 81 (Wyo. 1990). Included among the hearing examiner=s Conclusions of Law is this statement:
It is the opinion of the doctors that the work injury in 1995 weakened Pino=s disc and predisposed him to a disc herniation. There is no question that the cough in 1997 caused the disc herniation and caused Pino=s current back condition.
The thrust of the hearing examiner=s disposition is clear; he ruled that the cause of the herniation was a cough that occurred at home not the work place. Yet, there is nothing in the second compensable injury rule that attributes any significance to the place where the worker happened to be when the injury manifested itself nor is any triggering event required. Other cases simply report the increasing severity of the injury over time that ultimately required surgery. In Evenson, the triggering event was a slip and fall at home.
We have ruled in a different medical context that the causal connection between an accident or condition at the workplace is satisfied if the medical expert testifies that it is more probable than not that the work contributed in a material fashion to the precipitation, aggravation or acceleration of the injury. Claim of Taffner, 821 P.2d 103, 105 (Wyo. 1991). We do not invoke a standard of reasonable medical certainty with respect to such causal connection. Kaan v. State ex rel. Wyoming Workers= Compensation Div., 689 P.2d 1387, 1389 (Wyo.
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