Court Opinion

ID: 9668559
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 02:18:01.962422+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:46.099433
License: Public Domain

Dethmers, C. J.
(concurring). I concur in affirmance of the award to plaintiff.
To avoid further confusion, it should be observed that whether a plaintiff’s work was such as “required a degree of physical exertion not shown to have been unusual to or greater than that ordinarily experienced in the general field of common labor” is the test which has been employed by this Court, as in McGregor v. Conservation Department, 338 Mich 93; Nichols v. Central Crate & Box Co., 340 Mich 232; and Simpson v. Matthes, 343 Mich 125, only for the purpose of determining whether an accidental or fortuitous causal event had occurred such as to warrant compensation under part 2 of the act.* So long as this Court adheres to the view that “accident” is still prerequisite to compensation under part 2, application of that test to determine the occurrence of an accident is in nowise inconsistent with the use of the different test, borrowed from Connecticut *645(Glodenis v. American Brass Co., 118 Conn 29, 40 [170 A 146]), “whether the conditions of plaintiff’s employment must result in a hazard which distinguishes it in character from the general run of occupations” for the distinctly different purpose of determining, as in Samels v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, 317 Mich 149; Underwood v. National Motor Castings Division, Campbell, Wyant & Cannon Foundry Company, 329 Mich 273; Fields v. G. M. Brass & Aluminum Foundry Company, 332 Mich 113; Gibbs v. Motor Wheel Corporation, 333 Mich 617; and Kepsel v. McCready & Sons, 345 Mich 335, whether the disability is one which is, in the language of the statute, “due to causes and conditions which are characteristic of and peculiar to the'business of the employer and which arises out of and in the course of the employment” and, hence, is compensable under the occupational diseases provisions of part 7 of the act.* Part 2 is designed to reach one situation and part 7 another. Application of the appropriate test for determining compensability under part 2 does not amount to following a narrower interpretation of the statute than does application of the equally appropriate but different test for determining compensability under part 7. There is no conflict in that respect between the eases applying the former test to determine compensability under part 2 and those applying the latter test to determine compensability under part 7. It is the statute, not judicial fiat, which has fixed a different basis for compensability under the one than under the other.
The appeal board’s finding, supported by competent evidence, was that plaintiff suffered a subarach-noid hemorrhage which “may have been caused by this single incident” consisting of his having, on the *646date of injury, “fastened a load binder requiring very great and strenuous effort prior to falling in an unconscious state.” There is no competent medical testimony or other evidence to support a finding, and the appeal board did not find, that the hemorrhage actually was the result of the cumulative effects of frequent, strenuous exertions on the job in fastening such load binders on previous occasions. (Incidentally, the testimony is that on the occasion in question he was engaged in fastening the first load of the day.) Rather, it was the position of the appeal board that it is immaterial whether the injury resulted from a single incident or from a regular course of strenuous and unusual exertion, the board ■holding that in the- first situation plaintiff would be entitled to compensation under part 2 and in the latter under part 7. Under the medical testimony in the record, this is clearly a single-incident case, in which the injury may be localized- as to time and place. As said in Dailey v. River Raisin Paper Co., 269 Mich 443, 446, 447:
• “An injury whch may be so localized hardly seems "to fit the definition of an occupational disease as stated by the Court in Adams v. Acme White Lead & Color Works. 182 Mich 157, 160 (LRA1916A, 283, Ann Cas 1916D, 689, 6 NCCA 482), as
a‘A disease arising from causes incident to the patient’s occupation, as lead poisoning among painters. * * “It is a matter of weeks or months or years.” * * * It is drop by drop, it is little by . little, day after day for weeks and months, and finally enough is accumulated to produce symptoms.’ ”
In Beaty v. Foundation Co., 245 Mich 256, 259, this Court said:
“But when it is caused by a fixed and single fortuitous and preventable circumstance it is not an occupational. disease but an accident within the meaning of the workmen’s compensation law.”
*647(In making the above distinctions between disabilities compensable under part 2 of the act and those due to occupational disease, use of the term “accident” with respect to the former, pertinent both before and after adoption of part 7 of the act in 1937, is without particular significance since the 1943 amendment* eliminating “accident” as prerequisite to compensation under part 2.) See Adams v. Acme White Lead & Color Works, 182 Mich 157, 160 (160 LRA1916A, 283, Ann Cas 1916D, 689, 6 NCCA 482), in which this Court also said concerning occupational disease:
“In any case it is not the result of one contact or a single event.”
And see, to the same effect, Williams v. Missouri Valley Bridge & Iron Co., 212 Mich 150; Cazan v. City of Detroit, 279 Mich 86; Cell v. Yale & Towne Manfg. Co., 281 Mich 564; Thomas v. Parker Rust Proof Co., 284 Mich 260; Lucier v. Pansy Hosiery Co., Inc., 286 Mich 585. Accordingly, as it seems to me, there is no occasion here for discussion of the test applicable to or cases controlling of the question of compensability under part 7 of the act. This is a part 2 case.
Plaintiff suffered a disability resulting from a personal injury arising out of and in the course of his employment. For the reasons set forth in my opinion in Sheppard v. Michigan National Bank, 348 Mich 577, he is entitled to compensation under part 2 ■of the act. I would affirm the award, with costs to plaintiff.

 CL 1948, § 412.1 et seq. (Stat Ann 1950 Rev § 17.151 et seq.), as amended.

 CL 1948, § 417.1 et seq. (Stat Ajm 1950 Bey § 17.220 et seq.), as amended.

 PA 1943, No 245.