Opinion ID: 4512513
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Four-hour work day

Text: {¶ 20} “ ‘Permanent total disability’ means the inability to perform sustained remunerative employment due to the allowed conditions in the claim.” Ohio Adm.Code 4121-3-34(B)(1). In its second proposition of law, Navistar argues that Bisdorf could have worked four hours a day and that State ex rel. Bonnlander v. Hamon, 150 Ohio St.3d 567, 2017-Ohio-4003, 84 N.E.3d 1004, therefore required the commission to consider various nonmedical factors before granting Bisdorf’s request for PTD compensation. See State ex rel. Stephenson v. Indus. Comm., 31 Ohio St.3d 167, 173, 509 N.E.2d 946 (1987) (identifying age, education, and work record as relevant nonmedical factors). {¶ 21} However, the commission is the exclusive finder of fact in workers’ compensation matters. State ex rel. Vonderheide v. Multi-Color Corp., 156 Ohio St.3d 403, 2019-Ohio-1270, 128 N.E.3d 188, ¶ 7. And the commission did not find that Bisdorf could have worked four hours a day. On the contrary, it found that Bisdorf was incapable of performing any sustained remunerative employment 9 SUPREME COURT OF OHIO solely as a result of the medical impairments from his allowed physical conditions. Accepting Navistar’s argument would require us to reject that factual determination and substitute a new finding that Bisdorf was able to work four hours a day—an improper invasion of the commission’s role as the exclusive fact-finder. {¶ 22} In addition, Bonnlander is inapposite. In Bonnlander, we rejected an argument that the ability to work at least four hours a day necessarily means that the claimant can engage in sustained remunerative employment. Bonnlander at ¶ 13-14, 20. Rather, we held that “there is no hourly standard for determining one’s capability to perform sustained remunerative employment on a part-time basis. The commission decides whether a claimant is capable of sustained remunerative employment on a case-by-case basis.” Id. at ¶ 20. {¶ 23} Unlike in this case, the commission in Bonnlander found that the claimant could work up to four hours per day. 150 Ohio St.3d 567, 2017-Ohio4003, 84 N.E.3d 1004, at ¶ 5. The commission then considered the nonmedical factors listed in Stephenson, 31 Ohio St.3d at 173, 509 N.E.2d 946, and denied the claimant’s request for PTD compensation. Bonnlander at ¶ 6. While the commission may not deny PTD compensation without considering nonmedical factors, it may grant PTD compensation without considering nonmedical factors when “medical factors alone preclude sustained remunerative employment.” State ex rel. Galion Mfg. Div., Dresser Industries, Inc. v. Haygood, 60 Ohio St.3d 38, 40, 573 N.E.2d 60 (1991). That is what occurred here: the commission concluded based on medical evidence that Bisdorf could not work at all. Navistar’s argument that the commission was required to consider the Stephenson nonmedical factors is therefore not well-taken. Accordingly, we reject Navistar’s second proposition of law.