Opinion ID: 1344051
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: the hiatus between the cessation of temporary total disability benefits and a permanent partial disability award

Text: The petitioners contend that W.Va.Code, 23-4-7a [1979] demonstrates a clear intention that permanent partial disability benefits for an eligible claimant commence immediately upon the termination of temporary total disability benefits. In footnote 9 of Mitchell v. Compensation Commissioner, W.Va., 256 S.E.2d 1, 11 (1979) we said: The goal of administrative economy and expeditious handling of claimants strongly suggests that the Commissioner might, in appropriate cases in which he terminates temporary total disability benefits, also make an award for any permanent disability benefits that may be due the claimant.... Claimants might be less inclined to protest termination of temporary total disability benefits if they received a contemporaneous permanent disability award. Certainly, the two issues are inextricably entwined from a medical standpoint, and if both issues are treated by the Commissioner in the same order or by contemporaneous ones, the parties' protests can be heard together. We see nothing in the Workmen's Compensation statutes which precludes the Commissioner from adopting this administrative approach. W.Va.Code 23-4-7a(c) [1979] says, in pertinent part, that: [I]f the examining physician or physicians conclude that the claimant has reached his maximum degree of improvement and has permanent partial disability, the temporary total disability benefits shall continue for thirty days or until an order is entered granting to the claimant a permanent partial disability award, whichever shall first occur: .... The petitioners argue that W.Va.Code 23-4-7a [1979] establishes a legal obligation on the part of the Commissioner to make permanent partial disability awards within thirty days of the termination of temporary total disability benefits. As we indicated in Mitchell, supra, we believe that the clear intention of the statute was to reduce to the greatest extent possible the hiatus between the cessation of temporary total disability benefits and the award of permanent partial disability. We understand that the petitioners' fundamental complaint is that there are inefficiencies and bureaucratic delays throughout the workers' compensation system that impair the system's ability to make timely awards within 30 days. The statute upon which petitioners rely as the foundation for their claim of a clear legal right to the performance of a non-discretionary, ministerial duty is W.Va.Code 23-4-7a [1979]. Subsection (a) of this statute establishes a program for the monitoring of injury claims where the disability continues longer than might ordinarily be expected. It is not a general statutory provision designed to apply in all cases. Subsection (a) of W.Va.Code 23-4-7a [1979] does not require the Commissioner to refer a claimant for permanent partial disability evaluation immediately upon cessation of temporary total disability benefits. In fact, subsection (c), supra, of W.Va.Code 23-4-7a [1979] runs directly contrary to the petitioners' position that such a referral is immediately required. There does appear to us to be a clear intent in the total statutory scheme that in uncomplicated claims where there is no dispute about the percentage of permanent partial disability the award should be made within 30 days. In this mandamus action, however, petitioners have not presented us with any specific facts; rather, they have alleged patterns of behaviour that they conclude violate the statutes and ask us to direct the commissioner to change those patterns. The Commissioner denies such patterns, so we are at an impasse. In an appropriate case where it is demonstrated to the Court that there has been an unjustifiable hiatus between the termination of temporary total disability benefits and the granting of a permanent partial disability award, we would award a mandamus. On the basis of W.Va.Code 23-4-7a [1979] we cannot conclude that all of the complex medical and legal inquiries attendant upon the granting of a permanent partial disability award must be compressed, in all cases, into a bare 30 days when the issues to be decided are not cut-and-dried. Consequently, we find the petitioners' arguments on this subject unpersuasive and we decline to award relief in mandamus.