Opinion ID: 885192
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: mri/emg

Text: ¶ 75 The workers' compensation judge found that the denial of payment for the two diagnostic tests requested by S.L.H.'s treating physician was unreasonable and assessed a penalty against the State Fund, but declined to award attorney fees and costs on the issue. ¶ 76 S.L.H. again urges this Court to adopt a more flexible approach to assessing attorney fees and costs. As stated earlier, the language in § 39-71-612, MCA, explicitly providing that attorney fees are assessable only when the issue has been brought before the court for adjudication, precludes a court from assessing attorney fees when a party has conceded an issue prior to trial. The parties and the court agree that the MRI/EMG dispute had been conceded prior to trial and although the judge awarded a penalty and warned against second-guessing the treating physician, unless you have got some medical backup for it, the judge could not award attorney fees. We affirm the court's decision that attorney fees and costs could not be assessed against the State Fund for its unreasonable actions regarding the MRI and EMG tests, as the dispute was resolved prior to trial.