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Rogers v. Lowe's Home Improvement4/19/2005
pain and the sensory abnormality that he had.
Asked to clarify whether he had "an opinion to a reasonable degree of medical certainty as to whether the November 9th, 2001 incident, described to you by [plaintiff], caused or significantly aggravated any prior condition to the extent that he required the surgery, and other treatment you provided to him[,]" Dr. Amundson responded:
I think I came close to answering that question earlier when I said, you know, I'm really relying on what the patient tells me. And I think the description of lifting windows is a sufficient cause to injure a disk, which will result in a disk herniation. So within -- within that context I would say yes.
He further affirmed that nothing contained in plaintiff's medical records from Piedmont Triad "eliminates or contradicts the opinion that I gave[.]"
Nor was Dr. Amundson's opinion affected by his review ofplaintiff's medical records following the 9 November 2001 incident. Presented by defendant's counsel with plaintiff's records from PrimeCare, Dr. Amundson testified, "So, if I wanted to put all of this together in a sensible manner, I'd say, you know, he had a pulled muscle back in October. He lifted the windows [on 9 November 2001]. He aggravated the pre-existing hamstring injury , and caused his disk injury." When pressed by defendant's counsel, Dr. Amundson reiterated his position, as follows:
Q: . . . ow can you causally relate the herniated disk to November 9 of 2001[?]
A: . . . I think if I want to put all of this together in a sensible way, . . . I would say he had a pre-existing muscular problem. He describes injuring himself. The first thing that shows is the aggravation of that pre-existing muscle injury . And at least by the time I see him, he now has persistent symptoms, and he's developed radiculopathy. You know, very often the disk herniation occurs and it takes a while for the radiculopathy to show itself. This may have been what caught his attention first.
While defendant dismisses Dr. Amundson's reasoning due to the similarity of the symptoms recorded at PrimeCare to those displayed by plaintiff at Piedmont Triad in October of 2001, we note in plaintiff's hearing testimony that his records from PrimeCare did not accurately reflect the type of pain he experienced after 9 November 2001, or his lack of improvement during the course of his treatment at PrimeCare. The Commission's opinion and award includes a finding of fact that plaintiff's testimony regarding his medical history was credible. The Commission's credibilitydetermination is unreviewable and binding on appeal. Likewise, Dr. Amundson was entitled to credit his patient's account of his own pain symptoms in formulating his expert opinion.
Having found competent evidence to support the Commission's finding of causation, we affirm its award of benefits to plaintiff.
Affirmed.
Chief Judge MARTIN and Judge CALABRIA concur.
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