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Samaritan Health Services v. Industrial Commission5/28/1991
The question presented here is whether an injury which occurs while one is engaged in a work-related function, but which results from the worker's physical condition and an activity which involves no strain greater than that which one would experience in a normal nonemployment setting is a compensable injury. We find that it is.
I
In August 1988, when respondent employee, Olga Holbert, was 54 years old, she sustained an injury to her left knee while bending to perform a filing task. She timely protested the denial of her claim for workers' compensation.
At the compensability hearing, Ms. Holbert acknowledged having had left knee injuries in 1975, 1986 and 1987. The first injury required surgery and resulted in a
ratable permanent impairment. The 1986 injury , which also involved the left ankle, required medical treatment and resulted in some time loss from work. She last received medical treatment for this knee injury in February 1988. She was not questioned about the specific effects of the 1987 injury.
Ms. Holbert had worked for Samaritan since 1985. In December 1987, Samaritan transferred her to a sedentary clerical position in its radiology department because her left ankle could not tolerate the standing required by her normal food preparation work. She normally worked at her desk and only rarely performed filing tasks requiring stooping or squatting. On August 3, 1988, however, because of a staff shortage, she was asked to do filing work. This required her to reach a file located on a floor-level shelf while checking other records she was carrying in her other hand. She testified that she acted cautiously because of her preexisting impairment, but as she moved toward the floor, she felt her left knee pop and she experienced acute pain. She ultimately underwent arthroscopic surgery.
No medical testimony was presented at the hearing. Rather, Samaritan claimed that its expert would testify that claimant's previous left knee injuries predisposed her to further injury , but that the August 1988, bending or stooping motion was a contributing cause of her current knee symptoms. Ms. Holbert, on the other hand, claimed that her expert would testify that although she had a preexisting left knee impairment, the work-related activity had caused a new injury.
The administrative law judge (ALJ) found that "while in the process of bending/stooping/squatting (which is not really clear), to obtain . . . files from the lower drawer, [employee] felt a 'popping' sensation in her left knee, and the immediate onset of a burning type pain . . . ." He also found that this specific incident and the underlying weakness of the left knee jointly caused the acute pain and swelling, which in turn required medical treatment and resulted in increased disability. The ALJ concluded that Ms. Holbert had suffered a compensable new injury for which Samaritan was wholly responsible.
Samaritan requested administrative review, arguing that successive injury principles were inapplicable because Ms. Holbert's injury did not arise out of her employment with Samaritan:
This was not . . . a case involving simply "liability preference". It is rather our contention that, where a preexisting infirmity such as claimant here had, when coupled with later employment activity that involved no unusual stress, untoward motion, or exertion in excess of that which would occur in ordinary employment and nonemployment life, results in additional symptoms requiring medical treatment, then, such employment activity, under a proper constitutional construction of the "arising out of" clause of A.R.
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