Case Name: Quinton Tyronne DAWSON v. CITY OF SLIDELL
Court: Louisiana Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Louisiana
Decision Date: 2001-12-28
Citations: 804 So. 2d 902
Docket Number: No. 2000 CA 2265
Parties: Quinton Tyronne DAWSON v. CITY OF SLIDELL.
Judges: BEFORE: FITZSIMMONS and DOWNING, JJ., and LANIER, J. Pro Tern.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 804
Pages: 902–905

Head Matter:
Quinton Tyronne DAWSON v. CITY OF SLIDELL.
No. 2000 CA 2265.
Court of Appeal of Louisiana, First Circuit.
Dec. 28, 2001.
Michelle Sorrells, Baton Rouge, LA, Attorney for Plaintiff/Appellant, Quinton Tyronne Dawson.
Thomas M. Ruli, New Orleans, LA, Attorney for Defendant/Appellee, City of Sli-dell.
BEFORE: FITZSIMMONS and DOWNING, JJ., and LANIER, J. Pro Tern.
. The Honorable Walter I. Lanier, Jr., Judge (retired), First Circuit Court of Appeal, is serving as judge pro tempore by special appointment of the Louisiana Supreme Court

Opinion:
| ¡.FITZSIMMONS, J.
Plaintiff, Quinton Dawson, appealed an adverse judgment dismissing with prejudice his workers' compensation claim for expenses associated with his treatment for diabetes. We affirm.
FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
Quinton Dawson was employed as a laborer by the City of Slidell. On June 12, 1997, he injured his back in the course and scope of his employment. As part of his treatment, Mr. Dawson was given two epidural steroid injections. The second shot was given approximately two weeks after the first. After the second shot, Mr. Dawson suffered a severe hyperglycemic reaction and was admitted to the hospital on September 17, 1997. It is undisputed that this second epidural steroid injection at least partly caused Mr. Dawson's hyper-glycemic reaction. Mr. Dawson was diagnosed with diabetes during this hospital stay.
Mr. Dawson filed a claim for workers' compensation. By the trial date, the only issues remaining were 1) whether the injection caused Mr. Dawson's diabetes mel-litus and 2) whether Mr. Dawson's requirement for treatment of his diabetes is causally connected to his work-related injury such that the City of Slidell should be held liable under Louisiana workers' compensation law. After submission of post-trial memoranda, the workers' compensation court entered judgment dismissing Mr. Dawson's claim for the requested benefits, with prejudice.
Mr. Dawson appealed. In one assignment of error, he argues that the workers' compensation judge erred in concluding that Mr. Dawson's diabetic condition was not causally related to his on-the-job accident.
LEGAL PRECEPTS
The claimant-employee bears the burden of establishing a causal link be tween the work accident and the claimed disability. However, a pre-existing disease or infirmity of an employee does not automatically disqualify a compensation claim if the work-related injury aggravated, accelerated, or 13combined with the disease or infirmity to produce death or disability for which compensation is claimed. A disabled employee's work-related injury is presumed to have been aggravated, accelerated or combined to produce his disability if he proves that before the work-related injury he had not manifested disabling symptoms, but that commencing with the work-injury the disabling symptoms appeared and there is either medical or circumstantial evidence indicating a reasonable possibility of causal connection between the work-injury and the activation of the disabling condition. Once the employee has established the presumption of causation, the opposing party bears the burden of producing evidence and persuading the trier of fact that it is more probable than not that the work-related injury did not accelerate, aggravate or combine with the pre-existing disease or infirmity to produce his disability. Peveto v. WHC Contractors, 93-1402, pp. 2-3 (La.1/14/94), 630 So.2d 689, 691.
"[W]here two permissible views of the evidence exist, the factfinder's choice between them cannot be manifestly erroneous or clearly wrong." Stobart v. State, Department of Transportation and Development, 617 So.2d 880, 883 (La.1993). This is true even when "an appellate court may feel its own evaluations and inferences are more reasonable than the fact-finder's . " Stobart, 617 So.2d at 882.
APPLICATION OF LEGAL PRECEPTS TO THE FACTS
After a thorough review of the record, we cannot say that the workers' compensation judge erred in his findings of fact or judgment dismissing the claim. Notwithstanding any possible presumed causation, the record reasonably supports a finding that the injections for the back pain did not cause, aggravate, accelerate, or combine with the diabetes to produce the disability in question. The workers' compensation judge accepted the medical testimony that the injections did not cause the diabetes and had no real effect on the progress of the disease. Although Mr. Dawson's physician initially seemed to associate the diabetes with the injections, the doctor's subsequent notes stated that he explained to Mr. Dawson that the injections did not cause or affect the diabetes.
|4For these reasons, we affirm the judgment. The costs of the appeal are assessed to the plaintiff-appellant, Mr. Dawson.
AFFIRMED.
DOWNING, J., dissents and assigns reasons.