Case Title: Gullickson v. North Dakota W. Comp. Bureau

Citation: 83 N.W.2d 826

Docket Number: 

State: north-dakota

Court: North Dakota Supreme Court

Date: 1957-06-24T00:00:00Z

Document:
83 N.W.2d 826 (1957) Lyle N. GULLICKSON, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. NORTH DAKOTA WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION BUREAU, Defendant and Appellant. No. 7661. Supreme Court of North Dakota. June 24, 1957. *827 Leslie R. Burgum, Atty. Gen., and P. M. Sand, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellant. Cupler, Tenneson, Serkland & Leahy, Fargo, for respondent. GRIMSON, Chief Justice. This matter arises out of an injury sustained on Oct. 31, 1953 by Lyle N. Gullickson, claimant and respondent, while employed in Harry's Meat Market in Fargo, North Dakota. Harry's Meat Market was covered by the Workmen's Compensation Fund. The injury occurred when the claimant, in the course of his employment, slipped and fell. On Dec. 28, 1953, he filed a claim with the Workmen's Compensation Bureau (hereinafter referred to as the Bureau) for medical expenses incurred in connection therewith. That claim was accepted without a hearing and paid. On May 5, 1954, the claimant made another application for disability benefits and medical expenses which he claimed arose out of the same injury. That application was denied. Claimant then petitioned for a re-hearing which was granted. A rehearing was held on Sept. 1, 1955 before O. T. Owen, Chairman of the Bureau, at which time evidence was introduced. Thereupon the Bureau made its findings of fact, conclusions of law and order for judgment denying the subsequent claim of May 5, 1954. The claimant, feeling aggrieved, appealed to the district court of Cass County. The district court tried the case upon the record that was made before the Bureau and came to the conclusion that the findings of the Bureau were not supported by the evidence. The court then made its own findings of fact, conclusions of law and order for judgment granting the claim of the claimant. From the judgment entered thereon an appeal was taken to this court by the Bureau and a trial de novo demanded. The appeal specified a number of errors in the findings of the district court. The Bureau then summarizes the issues involved as follows: The Workmen's Compensation Bureau is an administrative agency and cases against the Bureau are tried under the Uniform Practice Act, Chapter 28-32, NDRC 1943. Section 28-3219, NDRC 1943, provides: In Burkhardt v. State, 78 N.D. 818, 53 N.W.2d 394, this court construed that section to mean that "the District Court must review the evidence contained in the record, certified from the Bureau to determine whether the findings of fact, made by the Bureau are supported by the evidence and its decision is in accordance with law." Further this court in Feist v. North Dakota Workmen's Compensation Bureau, 77 N.D. 267, 42 N.W.2d 665, 666, held that: A further statement on the procedure under Chapter 28-32, NDRC 1943, is found in the following statement from Northern Pacific Railway Co. v. McDonald, 74 N.D. 416, 422, 23 N.W.2d 49, 52; It is contended by the Bureau that the district court in reviewing the evidence erred in not finding it sufficient to sustain the findings of fact of the Bureau. The ground alleged is that there was a conflict in the claimant's evidence concerning which part of his body he fell on. The Bureau claims that taking one version thereof sustained its conclusion that the claimant was not entitled to compensation on his second application. It is the Bureau's contention that it is its duty to evaluate the testimony that is in conflict and that its findings thereon should not be disturbed. According to Sec. 28-3219, NDRC 1943 and the interpretation thereof, as cited in the foregoing cases, it was the duty of the district court to determine whether the facts proven on the hearing are sufficient to sustain the findings of fact and conclusions of the Bureau. In doing so the court is not bound by the findings of the Bureau. It shall affirm them only when such findings are supported by substantial evidence. Steamship Terminal Operating Corporation v. Schwartz, 2 Cir., 140 F.2d 7. *829 The first finding of fact by the Bureau reads as follows: The evidence shows that the claimant, Mr. Gullickson, was employed as a meat cutter for Harry's Meat Market at Fargo, North Dakota. In preparing for closing the market on the evening of Oct. 31, 1953, he was carrying out 40 or 50 pounds of waste material to the garbage cans. As he went through the back door he fell. No one saw him fall. In his application, Dec. 28, 1953, for payment of medical expenses he described that accident as follows: "Was carrying out garbage when slipped and fell on doorsill on my back." (Emphasis supplied.) That was verified as correct by Henry Platt the owner of the market. The other employees helped him get up. Claimant immediately went to St. Luke's Hospital for examination. Dr. Hall, who examined him in his report described the accident as told him by the claimant: "Feet went out from under and I lit on lower back while carrying garbage." (Emphasis supplied.) Then in stating what he found Dr. Hall said: "Contusion, right lateral trunk (eccymosis)." There is no explanation of this contusion. When the claimant made his application for compensation on May 5, 1955, he described his accident as follows: "Carrying out garbage and fell on left hip. No step." (Emphasis supplied.) It is claimed that this was at variance with the first application as to the spot on his body on which he fell. We do not, however, consider it at variance but at the most particularizing the area involved. It points out the particular part of the "low back" on which he fell. A fall on the "low back" necessarily was a fall on both hips. According to the Doctor's testimony a fall on the "low back" could affect either side. Dr. Swanson was asked: "Doctor, in relation to Dr. Hall's showing a bruise on the right side would you say that if a person takes a fall on his back and is bruised on the right side that does not exclude a shock to the left side which would cause the condition you describe?" Ans. "No, in this fall, we do not know just what happened. It would indicate from Dr. Hall's report that he fell on his right side but there is nothing in that report that would preclude the possibility that in falling he might have wrenched his left hip which could be just as bad as the contusion of the fall." He also testified: "The X-ray doesn't say anything about it. Where the X-rays were taken it gives his whole spine." The only basis for the Bureau's claim that the fall was on claimant's "right side" was the statement by Dr. Hall in his report of "a contusion on the right lateral trunk." At the time the doctor made that report he knew and reported that the claimant said he fell on the "low back," and that the X-ray showed the whole spine. It is more likely that the doctor thought his statement that he found a contusion coincided with his patient's description of the accident than that he was trying to contradict him. If we visualize the circumstances of the fall as described by claimant his statement seems reasonable. He says he went out the back door carrying 40 or 50 pounds of garbage. He would naturally be leaning back to keep his balance. When stepping down out of the doorway he slipped, lost his balance and fell on his low back on the doorsill. In the hearing before the Bureau after his second application the claimant still maintained that he fell on his low back. He testified: In effect he maintained the same account of his fall throughout. An attack is also made on the testimony of the claimant in regard to a visit to St. Luke's Hospital on August 11, 1953. He claimed he did not remember that visit but he did not deny that he consulted doctors on account of some pains in his hip before the accident. He was asked: "Ans. Yes." There was no attempt to conceal the fact that he had consulted doctors on pains in his hip prior to his fall on Oct. 31, 1953. That he did not remember this occasion on August 11 is, perhaps, explained by Dr. Stafne's statement regarding that visit that "He also stated he had been drinking for several days." Claimant's lack of remembrance of that particular examination cannot be held to destroy his whole testimony as long as he willingly testified to the effect that he had consulted doctors on account of his hip before his October accident. In reviewing the testimony as we must do on a trial de novo we do not find any real conflict for the Bureau or the court to decide. Nor is there sufficient evidence to sustain this Bureau's finding that the claimant fell "striking the right side of the body." The district court was clearly right in refusing to adopt the first finding of fact by the Bureau heretofore quoted. The next two findings of the Bureau bearing on the issues which the district court failed to adopt are as follows: We will now consider the evidence bearing on these findings. The testimony of Dr. Stafne is to the effect that claimant had come to St. Luke's Hospital on August 11, 1953, complaining of a dull pain in the left leg starting in the groin and going down inside the leg to the foot * * * and that he had had some low backache on previous occasions. An X-ray of his "lumbar-sacral spine" was taken at that time. The report of that showed: "Negative lumbar spine and sacroiliac joints, osteoarthritis changes both hips, more marked on the left, where there is some flatening of the femoral head and narrowing of the joint space, small shadow of calcification overlying the mid portion of the left kidney and a small calculus overlying the cortex of the rt. kidney." The X-ray taken on Oct. 31, 1953, right after the accident shows: "Lumbar spine. "Slight narrowing of the lumbo-sacral interspace. *831 "Lumbar spine otherwise negative. The claimant stated that while he had pain in his hip prior to the fall on Oct. 31, 1953, it had not been continuous nor severe. He had been able to continue his work of carrying quarters and halves of beef and doing his work as a meat cutter. The testimony is that he was not drinking intoxicating liquors during the day or evening of the accident. He testified that when he fell on Oct. 31, he was stunned from the pain and kind of lost consciousness just for a minute. One of the clerks came out and helped him to get up. Leonhart Voelker, who worked with him in Harry's Market, recalls "that the appearance and expressions of Lyle Gullickson at the time he was seen lying on the floor immediately after the fall evidenced that he was in a great deal of pain and at that time was suffering from the effects of the fall." Claimant immediately reported at the clinic. He was then examined by Dr. Hall and the X-ray hereinbefore referred to, was taken. He was advised to go home and apply warm packs which he did. He returned to work the second morning after the accident but found that he could not stand it. Three weeks afterward he left that employment because he "just couldn't carry beef anymore at all. * * * My hip was getting so terrible." Then he went to Dr. Swanson, an orthopedic surgeon. After getting claimant's history and examining him Dr. Swanson found that: It was then determined that an operation called "Smith-Peterson cup arthroplasty" should be performed on claimant. That is the placing of an artificial cup into the hip socket to form a plastic joint. That was done in late April 1954. He was not to bear much weight on his hip for the first six months. He got around in a chair for two months but could not do any work. In June 1955 he tried working at Dick's Market, found after a couple of days that his leg got so tired "it really ached" and that he could not do any lifting. At the time of the hearing he was trying to prepare himself for some sedentary work. Thus it appears that the claimant had an arthritic condition prior to the fall on Oct. 31, 1953. That does not entitle him to compensation. Immediately after the fall that condition became worse and the operation "Smith-Peterson cup arthroplasty" had to be performed. The question then is whether it was the fall on Oct. 31, 1953 or the arthritic condition which caused the disability that necessitated the operation. On that Dr. Swanson testified as follows: Mr. Serkland asked: Mr. Sand continued: The evidence clearly shows that claimant had a more or less dormant arthritic condition prior to Oct. 31, 1953. It, however, did not prevent him from carrying on his usual work including the lifting and carrying of quarters and halves of beef, and would not have done so if nothing had happened. After the fall, however, he began to suffer pains, especially in his left hip and had to give up his work. The pains increased to the extent that he had to have the Smith-Peterson cup arthroplasty operation performed. It follows that the operation was not the result of the arthritic condition, but that the fall aggravated that condition and made the operation necessary. In Pace v. North Dakota Workmen's Compensation Bureau, 51 N.D. 815, 826, 201 N.W. 348, 352, the deceased, for whose death the case was brought, had collapsed in the course of his employment. He had been suffering from arteriosclerosis. The court said: "Acceleration of a pre-existing disease to a fatal conclusion would, in such circumstances, be an injury within the Compensation Law." In Palmer v. Sample, 141 Neb. 36, 2 N.W.2d 583, 585, the plaintiff, in coming down a stairs in the course of his employment, slipped and "struck right in the middle of his back and rolled the rest of the way down the steps." Following that he was unable to work. The court said: In Ray v. Department of Labor, 177 Wash. 687, 33 P.2d 375, 376, the court said: Clearly the evidence fails to support findings 8 and 9 of the Workmen's Compensation Bureau. The district court was justified in setting them aside and in finding that the accidental fall on Oct. 31, was the cause of claimant's disability by waking up that dormant arthritic condition. The Bureau then raises the question of whether the court has correctly found the damages. The Bureau claims the evidence does not warrant the amount allowed by the court for damages. Section 65-0515, 1953 Suppl. NDRC 1943, provides: Section 65-0511, 1953 Suppl. NDRC 1943, provides: Section 65-0512, 1953 Suppl. NDRC 1943, provides: The evidence shows that the claimant was earning $65 per week at Harry's Market and was the father of a minor, dependent child. Within three weeks after the injury the claimant had to cease all work because of the pain and suffering resulting after the fall. According to the testimony the arthritic condition would not have so disabled him. As a result of the fall, according to the evidence he was unable to work at least until June 1st, 1955. That establishes a period of total disability induced by the awakening of the arthritic condition by the accidental fall. The evidence shows that disability extended for a period of 80 weeks. The maximum allowance for total disability, according to Sec. 65-0511 is $31.50 per week. That was the allowance made by the district court. In addition to that an allowance of $2.80 per week was made for the same length of time for the minor dependent under the age of 18 years as provided in Sec. 65-0509, 1953 Supp. NDRC 1943. The district court also allowed all the medical bills incurred and $300 for attorney fees. The evidence is sufficient to sustain all such allowances and they are confirmed. In addition to that the court allowed 50 percent partial, permanent disability from June 1, 1955, for a period of 250 weeks, plus the sum of $2.80 per week while his dependent minor child was under the age of 18 years. There was not sufficient evidence before the district court to make such determination. While the claimant was unable to work until June 1, 1955, there is no sufficient showing what his partial disability would be after that. The court has established the liability of the Bureau for payment of partial permanent disability to the claimant in proportion to what the evidence may warrant. Sec. 65-0512, 1953 Supp. NDRC 1943. This can be established by the Bureau on taking further testimony as to his present disability and outlook for the future. The case is therefore remanded to the district court with instructions to return the case to the Bureau for the purpose of determining the extent of the partial, permanent disability suffered by the claimant. Such determination to be made after a *834 hearing at which the claimant has had an opportunity to be heard. In all other respects the judgment of the District Court is affirmed. BURKE, MORRIS, SATHRE and JOHNSON, JJ., concur.