Iowa Workers' Compensation

In Love's Enterprises, Inc. v. Love and Second Injury Fund of Iowa , No. 10-1131 (Iowa App. April 27, 2011), the court affirmed a finding of permanent total disability, declining the employer's request to the court to reweigh the evidence and reverse the finding of permanent total disability. Claimant was the owner and operator of Love's Enterprises.  Claimant had a traumatic injury to his ankle, and cumulative injuries to his back, neck, knee and  bilateral wrists.  Claimant's treater, Dr. Delbridge, found that the ankle, knee, neck and wrist injuries were related to claimant's work.  He opined that there was a 20% body as a whole injury.  A vocational expert (Roger Marquardt) stated that because claimant lacked the capability of performing even sedentary work, he was eliminated from consistently working and earning money in the competitive labor market.  Following his injuries, claimant performed no more construction work, and eventually turned over the b...

In Swift Pork Co. v. Garcia-Diaz, No. 10-1805 (Iowa App. April 27, 2011), the court of appeals, in a single paragraph, affirmed the decision of the agency that claimant had demonstrated that claimant's injury was to the body as a whole.  In the underlying decision before the agency, Dr. Stoken had indicated that claimant had Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS) despite meeting only five of the eight criteria in the AMA Guides.  Dr. Pollack had found that there was no CRPS. The court of appeals, based on this factual dispute, and the credibility finding by the agency, affirms the agency's permanent total disability finding.

In Kone, Inc. v. Harrison , No. 08-891 (Iowa App. Feb. 23, 2011), the Iowa Court of Appeals addressed a situation where the deputy found the claimant not to be credible, and concluded that claimant had failed to establish a permanent impairment.  The commissioner reversed the decision on compensability, finding that the medical evidence supported the contention that there was a permanent impairment.  Also presented were issued of whether claimant retired because of his injuries or because of a planned retirement, and whether penalty was appropriate.  The commissioner concluded, contrary to the hearing deputy, that claimant was entitled to both healing period and penalty benefits.  The district court reversed the agency's decision on all three issues. The court noted the in determining whether substantial evidence supported the agency's decision, it was the agency's decision that was being reviewed, not the decision of the hearing deputy.  Although the district...

The Westling  case, decided on February 9, 2009, addressed the issue of whether claimant's work injury resulted in a permanent partial disability.  Claimant suffered an injury to his right shoulder while working for the employer, and had a debridement and acromionectomy.  He was returned to work without restrictions, worked for a few months, and retired from Hormel, where he had worked for thirty years. The deputy found that claimant had failed to establish a causal connection between his shoulder injury and permanent disability.  This decision was upheld by the commissioner, and Westling filed a rehearing request, asking the commissioner to decide whether the definition of permanent impairment in the AMA Guides  was synonymous with the judicial definition of functional disability.  The commissioner denied the request for rehearing, finding that the agency had relied on undisputed medical evidence that the claimant's work was not a cause of a permanent sh...

This Court of Appeals case, decided on February 9, 2011, addresses an issue of permanent total disability.  Although the commissioner found that claimant had sustained permanent total disability based on an odd lot theory, the district court reversed, finding that the claimant had failed to demonstrate that his injury was work related and also failed to prove he was an odd lot employee.  The Court of Appeals reverses, concluding that the district court improperly weighed the evidence in overruling the finding that claimant had not established a work related injury.  The court also affirmed the odd lot finding of the commissioner. The evidence demonstrated that claimant reached for pieces of a door while at work, and caught his right leg on a torn fatigue mat, feeling a stinging sensation in his hip. Claimant did not immediately report the incident, and worked the next day.  On the second day after his accident, he saw a PA, but the records do not note a work accide...