Opinion ID: 1598483
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Loss of Use of Right Leg.

Text: The Fund asserts that because the injury to Bergeson's right knee did not affect his ability to work or to do the things he did before the injury, he suffered no loss of use of his right leg. Bergeson's treating physician found a partial permanent physical impairment of the right knee of ten percent based primarily upon the surgical removal of a meniscus. This ten percent rating was supported by the guides to the evaluations of permanent impairment published by the American Medical Association. Iowa has adopted the guides for the determination of permanent partial disability. 343 Iowa Admin.Code 2.4(85) (1993). No medical evidence or testimony rebutted the physician's estimate. To invoke Fund liability, the first injury need only be a scheduled injury. See Braden, 459 N.W.2d at 470. Because a scheduled injury is evaluated by determining the loss of physiological capacity of the body part, not by evaluating the impairment of earning capacity, the first injury does not have to result in an industrial disability to constitute a loss of use under section 85.64. The injury to Bergeson's right knee resulted in a scheduled injury to his right leg. There is substantial evidence to support the commissioner's finding that Bergeson suffered a ten percent loss of use of his right leg from the first injury.